


Of Two Contrary Paths

by Sunfreckle



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: 1830s, Betaed, Character Development, Courtship, Declarations Of Love, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Ethics, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Falling In Love, Forgiveness, France (Country), Friendship/Love, Happy Javert, Healing, Historically correct, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Javert as a father, Javert as a husband, Javert as a lover, Kindness, Love, Marriage, Marriage Proposal, Morality, Paris (City), Paris Uprising 1832, Redemption, Religion, Romance, Slow Burn, Stars, Suicide Attempt, This was supposed to be simple how did I end up researching 1830's back injury treatment?, Victorian era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-20
Updated: 2016-07-23
Packaged: 2018-06-03 10:38:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 40,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6607597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunfreckle/pseuds/Sunfreckle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Formerly called <i>Javert's Redemption</i>*)</p><p>Javert wakes up in a hospital bed with as little will to live as when he dove into the Seine that cold, dark night. This slowly changes, however, as he makes the acqaintance of a kind spinster, whose bourgeois father allows her to provide charity to the hospital. Eventually Javert begins to realise that even though his old life may be over, life still has a hold on him.</p><p>This story focusses on the physical, emotional and moral recovery of Javert and attempts to provide insight in his character, including his views on his parents, his actions concerning the rebellion, Valjean, Les Amis, God and life in general. The slow burn romance pulls it all together. There are nods to the musical, but apart from that this fic is meant to be historically acurate.</p><p>Credits:<br/>Story, OC's and obsessing over general historical details by me.<br/>Reading of The Brick for all the necessary details and beta reading by my sister.<br/>Advice and research on 19th century French (bourgeois) culture by Groucha.</p><p>Warning: Christian/Catholic themes, depression, T rating for mention of suicide.</p><p>* Javert's Redemption was a working title that overstayed it's welcome.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert wakes up in a hospital bed and is the unwilling recipient of charity.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _"He beheld before him two paths, both equally straight, but he beheld two; and that terrified him; him, who had never in all his life known more than one straight line. And, the poignant anguish lay in this, that the two paths were contrary to each other. One of these straight lines excluded the other. Which of the two was the true one?"_

 

_1832, Paris_

…

A dull light reached Javert’s eyes. He felt heavy, as if a great weight pressed down on him from all sides. Was this death? He opened his eyes further. White cotton enveloped him. A dark panic reached up from his heart to his throat. Wildly his eyes glanced round. A hospital. He was bound to a hospital bed. The cold river Seine had betrayed him. It had failed to take his life. Failed to quiet the turmoil of his mind once and for all in its darkness.

A single involuntarily cry of anguish escaped him. A nurse came rushing to his bedside immediately.

“Monsieur, you are awake again,” she said in a calm voice, full of kindness.

He looked at her with bewildered eyes.

“Rather more awake than before I see,” she said encouragingly. “You are very strong Monsieur, you have survived a great deal.”

Javert closed his eyes in defeat. He could not bear the thought of living and yet he lived.

“That’s right, Monsieur,” the nurse said soothingly. “Rest, I will check on you again soon.”

No answer came from the broken man strapped to the hospital bed. Javert was aware that pain seemed to be waking up in the depths of his body, but this suffering was not equal to the suffering of his mind.

His consciousness soon left him again. When the nurse returned he was still and unresponsive as ever he had been. She was hopeful however. His waking moments had become more frequent and the look in his eyes more coherent. At any rate, in many cases such as these time and rest were the only possible restorative, after the first dangers of fatality had been warded off.

…

When Javert woke again it was to the noise of doctors and nurses doing their rounds. He did not know how much time had passed.

“Good morning, Monsieur,” a nurse greeted him.

It took all his effort to speak a single, short sentence: “Where am I?”

“You are in the Hôpital de la Charité,” she smiled compassionately. “You were dragged from the river by boatmen, very near death.”

Javert looked down, at the bonds that fixed him to the bed.

“You have a severe back injury, Monsieur,” the nurse said gently. “It is important you lie still.”

Javert did not answer. He did not try to move. He did not do anything.

“Can you tell me your name, Monsieur?” the nurse asked.

He remained silent and looked away.

“Never mind, Monsieur,” she said kindly. “The doctor will see you soon.”

Javert closed his eyes. His mind was clearer now, but no less oppressed. He lived, he was recovering. Life had been forced upon him in the cruellest of ways and he had no power to change it. He did not protest to the doctors' examinations, or the medicines they gave him. Not a word passed his lips, nor any cries of pain. They entreated him to tell them anything he remembered, his name, his address, his occupation. All their questions remained unanswered. Eventually they left him, fearing that his mind had suffered damage beyond their first expectations.

…

“It is good to see you again, Mademoiselle.”

“I thank you, Madame Comtois.”

Soft footsteps came towards the curtain surrounding Javert’s bed.

“Who is the new patient?”

“The man they rescued from the Seine, I am afraid his mind has left him. He has only spoken once since his being admitted here.”

Through the greyness of his melancholy mind Javert became aware of the soft voices discussing his person. He recognized one of the voices as belonging to one of the old nurses. The second was unknown to him.

“You are very welcome to sit with him,” he heard Nurse Comtois say. “Poor man.”

The curtain was drawn aside and a woman in her late twenties or early thirties approached his bed. “Good afternoon, Monsieur,” she spoke softly. “Is it alright if I sit with you?”

Javert did not answer, but he did not turn away his eyes. The presence of this lady shocked him. He must call her a lady, for she was dressed in a fine gown. A nurse’s apron covered it, but that merely made the fine dark blue silk of her dress seem more splendid. Curls framed her face and the rest of her hair had been twisted up in a heavy braid. She was clutching some books.

She sat down, looking enquiringly at him as he stayed silent. “My name is Marion Beaumont,” she said, smiling at him.

He remained silent.

“Will you not tell me your name, Monsieur?” she entreated.

Silence still.

“Would you allow me to read to you, Monsieur?” she said pleasantly. She did not really expect an answer, but he did not avert his eyes and she took this as a sign of at least partial approbation. “I have some beautiful novels here,” she continued in her gentle voice. “And a collection of fine essays.” She gave him a cheerful smile. “Perhaps a novel would be the pleasantest at present…”

She opened the first of her books and started reading aloud. She kept her voice low, so as not to disturb anyone and she read carefully and clearly. Every so often she glanced at her unresponsive listener, to watch for signs of discomfort or displeasure.

Javert did not feel anything that could be called either pleasure of displeasure. The foremost emotion he felt was confusion. He did not know what this woman meant by sitting in a sickroom and reading. Such attention, he felt, was neither deserved nor wished for by him. Even so, eventually her reading distracted him from his own thoughts.

Javert had never had a love for books. He respected them as vessels of instruction. They were instruments employed to better himself and he had studied them in the few hours of leisure he had formerly allowed himself. This study had not given him any pleasure, however, only the satisfaction of doing what he believed he ought to do. Novels he never read at all. Mademoiselle Beaumont’s interest in the novel was evident. Her voice, however low, was animated. She spoke for its characters with conviction and did its descriptions justice. Javert listened and was transported, for a short while, to a place outside of himself.

“Mademoiselle?”

Mademoiselle Beaumont looked up from her book.

“Yes?”

“Your father asks for you,” Nurse Comtois said.

“Tell him I shall be with him directly,” she answered.

Carefully she closed the book and smiled at Javert, who was still lying unmoving and silent in his bed. She met his eyes, however, and was convinced he was very much awake. “I must go now,” she said. “But I shall return some other time and we may continue this book if it pleases you.”

Javert watched her rise to her feet and gather her books.

“Good day, Monsieur,” she said. “May your recovery be quick.” With those words she passed through the slit in the curtain and left the room with quick steps.

Javert wondered again why she had come at all. Had the nurse spoken of her father? Was he a patient or a doctor? Why did she feel she must return? To _him_. A man too wretched to even be allowed to die. His exhaustion saved him from further thoughts and it carried him off into a deep sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the first fanfic I have put actual care, craft and research into. I really hope you enjoy it!
> 
> [The Hôpital de la Charité](https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%B4pital_de_la_Charit%C3%A9_de_Paris) was a real place and in full working order at the time of this story (it closed in 1935). I did some research and found out that it was customary to bind patients with spinal injury to their bed with leather straps to prevent them from moving. That is the state in which I imagine Javert found himself when he woke up.


	2. Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert finally speaks and we get to know Marion.

Monsieur Beaumont was a man of means and good education. He conducted his business with honour and discretion and had raised his three children to the best of his abilities. By way of reward he had had the pleasure of seeing his sons as successful as himself and had for a number of years, seen his daughter quite admired by Parisian society. Marion, however, was very unwilling to fulfil the role of the young debutante. Although very fond of society, she immediately took a great dislike to being a part of the marriage market where any defects of her face were to be weighed against the fortune of her father. She had scarcely been out for two seasons before she felt that to spend all the days of her youth in the same manner, would be nothing short of a tragedy.

In no way disposed to force a child down a path that did not coincide with their natural talents Monsieur Beaumont had asked his daughter to name a way she felt her time would be better spent.

Marion had settled on furthering her education and involving herself in charity. This was perfectly acceptable to her father, who was rather indifferent to politics, but very feeling towards all human suffering. Marion Beaumont had therefore, besides running her father’s household, become a benefactor to the poor, the sick and the infirm. Wherever she saw difficulties she tried to help, either by giving her time, her money or her energy. For where Mademoiselle Beaumont found a just cause, other ladies and gentlemen soon found a worthy recipient of their charity as well.

Her father could only reproach his daughter with being too apt to think well of people and the world in general. This led him to try and shield her from its more cruel and ugly components, if only to preserve her optimistic spirit. She accompanied him to the Hôpital de la Charité, in which he had taken a particular interest, at least once a month and Monsieur Beaumont took pride in his daughter’s willingness to enter any sickroom. He did not allow her to visit those whose complains were of a putrid tendency, but he encouraged her to visit all others whose suffering might be alleviated by the cheerfulness of her mind or the coins in her purse.

Now, sitting in her father’s carriage, Marion was thinking earnestly on the fate of the poor man that seemed not able to recall who he was. She wished she had spoken to the doctor about him.

“Why so quiet, my dear?” her father asked.

“Nothing, Papa,” she said, quickly smiling. “Our visits to the hospital always make me reflect upon life.”

“Well, do not let it make you unhappy,” Monsieur Beaumont said.

“I won’t, Papa,” she smiled. “As I assure you every week.”

Monsieur Beaumont laughed. “You are so like your dear mother,” he said. “Forever finding fault with my loving speeches.”

Marion smiled. She did not remember much of her mother, beyond a soft touch and a friendly smile. Still, a comparison with her was the biggest compliment anyone could pay her and her brothers and father did so very often.

“Shall you be visiting the hospital next week?” she asked her father.

“I think not,” he shook his head. “I have more pressing business to attend to.”

“Then I will go alone if you would give me leave,” Marion said.

“Of course, my dear,” her father consented. “But let Geraud determine the route and do not leave the carriage. Things have calmed down thankfully, but not all the streets are quite safe yet.”

Marion silently agreed. She abhorred violence and shared much of her father’s indifference for politics. Still, she hoped some good would come from what they now called the June rebellion. Then the blood that had been spilled had at least not been spilled in vain.

…

Despite her promise, Javert was surprised to see Mademoiselle Beaumont again. She smiled at him warmly, as if he had met her with a look of pleased recognition, instead of his blank stare.

“Here I am again, you see,” she said, sitting down. “And I have not forgotten where we left off.” She opened her book at the marked place. “Shall we continue then?” she smiled.

Javert looked at her earnestly, but still he did not answer. He could not. He had not yet reconciled himself to this life, perhaps the life of an invalid, that he would now have to lead. Speaking seemed to him a way to seal his fate, to acknowledge that he was truly alive and would remain so.

Marion did not recognize the turmoil behind his eyes as anything other than physical pain and started reading aloud once again. She noticed that the sick man sometimes closed his eyes, but he always opened them again to look at her. She was sure he was listening. At the end of a particularly suspenseful chapter, a sigh escaped him.

“It is terrible, isn’t it Monsieur,” she said feelingly. “But luckily we need not stop here.” Hastily she turned the page and read on, eager for the characters to overcome their difficulties.

Javert listened with growing amazement as well as increasing interest. The story, her voice, her smiles…they calmed his mind. She brought a kind of beauty into a world he had lately failed to understand.

“I will stop here, Monsieur,” Marion said finally, breaking the spell. “I will have to go soon and if I read any further we will perhaps reach a point that does not make as good a temporary ending.” She closed the book and looked at him with great concern. “I do hope your injuries will continue to mend,” she said. “Docteur Piorry has told me your spine was badly damaged, but he has high hopes for your recovery.”

As she got up and gathered her books, Javert felt a twinge of guilt. Here was a lady, attending to him and he was insulting her by not rewarding any of her efforts with a response.

“I wish you health, Monsieur,” Marion said, turning to him to take her leave.

Javert exerted himself. “I thank you,” he spoke weakly.

Marion’s smile lit up her entire face. “You have well rewarded me,” she said earnestly. “Good day.”

Javert watched her go. She had not said she would return, but her words had certainly implied it. Still, he would not expect her next week.

…

Marion returned within a week. She greeted Javert kindly and continued the novel. He listened in silence. When she closed it again she said with a smile: “One more sitting will finish it.”

Javert did not answer, but he was sorry for it.

“How do you feel today, Monsieur?” she asked him. “The doctor spoke well of your progress.”

He remained silent.

Marion sighed. “I do hope you share the doctor's opinion,” she said. “Good day, Monsieur.”

“Good day, Mademoiselle,” Javert said suddenly.

Marion turned round and smiled at him. “Good day,” she repeated gently and left.

…

Javert was truly on the mend. The doctors told him it was a miracle his nerves were not more badly damaged. He felt their words to be true, but he did not rejoice in them. Whenever the doctor visited him he sank into a state of such depression that he was hardly aware of his surroundings.

From such a state he was startled by the appearance of Mademoiselle Beaumont when she called again.

“Shall we finish our novel?” she said, after her unanswered enquiries into his health.

“Please,” he said.

She smiled brightly and began reading. The remaining pages of the story made it their business to punish the wicked, reward the good, see lovers reunited and quests completed. Marion read the last sentence with great satisfaction and sighed her earnest approbation.

“It is beautiful,” Javert said, unable to fully comprehend his feelings on the subject.

“I am glad you think so,” Marion smiled. She looked at him earnestly and thought he seemed more present than he had ever done. “Monsieur,” she said. “Can you really not tell me your name?”

Javert averted his eyes, but Marion would not give up this time.

“Surely you remember something,” she urged. “The nurses told me you wore a fine uniform. Does that not make you remember?”

Javert looked at her, a pained expression contorting his face.

“Oh, Monsieur,” Marion said sorrowfully. “I would so like to be able to call you by your name.”

“Javert,” he answered. He had said it before he could reconsider. He sighed. “Emile Javert.”

Marion looked at him with an expression nothing short of rapturous. “Monsieur Javert,” she said earnestly. “It is _good_ to know your name.”

Javert looked at her and saw she truly meant it. He cast down his eyes. “I do not deserve your kindness, Mademoiselle,” he said. “I have given you no reason to express it.”

“Kindness should not only be given where it is deserved, but especially where it is needed,” Marion said tenderly.

“Even then it had better be bestowed elsewhere, on someone who might still benefit from it,” he spoke dolefully.

“Do not give way to such thoughts, Monsieur,” Marion entreated him. “You are not so ill today as when first I saw you.”

“My illness can never be cured,” Javert said. “For it is of the soul, not of the body.”

Marion put her novel aside and gave him a concerned frown. “What makes you say that, Monsieur?” she asked.

“I have always strived,” he said with great effort. “To live my life according to the principles of rectitude, order, and honesty. But I have erred and what I considered morally right could no longer be connected with what I knew to be legally correct.”

Marion saw the pain in his eyes and understood that to him, these thoughts were more of a plight than any physical ailment. “If you have erred,” she said gently. “You must reconsider your maxims and try to do right by those you feel you have wronged.”

“I cannot,” he protested. “I cannot question the authority that has always led my life. The law and God are just. If I do not comprehend them, I am to blame.”

“And is the law so all-encompassing it does not allow for interpretation?” Marion exclaimed, truly surprised that anyone could fail to see that what was written on paper must always be translated before it could be put into action.

Her words shocked Javert deeply, but his face was too pale to display the emotion properly and she did not see it.

“And is God not disposed to forgive us our wrongs if we recognize them and try to make amends?” she carried on with conviction.

Javert did not answer her, but Marion’s looks demanded an answer.

“The lord shall reward only righteousness,” he replied, after a long silence.

“That may be,” Marion said. “But surely you cannot believe His eyes are blind to everything _but_ righteousness.” She rose to her feet, convinced she needed more than her own words to persuade the suffering man before her.

Javert watched her go with great distress, but she returned immediately with a bible in her hand.

“You will see, Monsieur,” she said. “That my fingers do not turn the pages of this book with as much skill as they do the pages of a novel, but I shall do my best.”

Her eyes found a psalm and she read it, slowly, but not soberly as Javert was used to read them. She read it like another would have read poetry. Javert could not tell whether this was because she was more familiar with poetry than with psalms or if she was simply convinced that they were in essence the same thing.

“Bless the Lord, oh my soul,” Marion read. “And all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and forget not all his benefits: Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases;”

Javert listened as Marion progressed through the psalm, sometimes almost stumbling over a word.

“The lord is merciful,” she read with emphasis. “And gracious. Slow to anger and plenteous in mercy. He will not always chide, neither will he keep his anger forever. He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy towards them that fear him.”

She turned her eyes on Javert with a pleading smile. “Is there no hope in this?” she implored. “Surely you should be more assured of His mercy, as you clearly fear Him far more than I do.”

Involuntarily something like a smile passed over Javert’s face. “You speak in jest,” he said.

“Not really, Monsieur,” she answered.

“Please finish the psalm, Mademoiselle,” he said. “If you would.”

“Certainly,” she replied and she read the entire psalm, in the same light tone of voice she had used before.

It was not proper, Javert thought, but it became her.

“Thank you,” he said, when she closed the bible.

“No need, Monsieur,” she replied. “I am glad you chose confide in me.”

He regarded her with growing concern. Her words disturbed him, but this disturbance had at least for the present lifted something of his depression.

“Monsieur,” Marion broke the silence. “I beg your permission to tell the nurse your name.”

Javert gravely gave her his consent. He had returned to the living now and he did not see the use of any further resistance.

“I shall leave you the bible,” Marion said, placing it beside his bed, within his reach. “But once you have finished your reflections upon your faith, I would dearly recommend a novel for the recovery of your spirits.”

Her words had the desired effect: the shadow of a smile appeared once more on his face.

“Good day, Monsieur Javert,” she said warmly.

“Good day, Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he replied.

…

Marion was very much disturbed by the words Javert had spoken. It had been a comfort to her to be able to tell nurse Comtois the sick man had finally spoken. She had told her his name, but had also mentioned with some concern the depressed state of his feelings. Nurse Comtois did not share her fears, however.

“Such things are common enough, Mademoiselle,” she had said, shaking her head. “The depression will pass as his mind and body regain strength.”

Now, sitting in her father’s carriage, Marion doubted whether time and health alone were enough to change convictions that seemed to be so utterly fixed. Monsieur Javert had not spoken irrationally, he had spoken what he genuinely believed to be true.

These thoughts still inspired silence and thoughtfulness in her when she sat down to dinner with her father.

“You look discontented, Marion,” her father remarked. “Has anything unpleasant happened during the course of your day?”

“Not at all, Papa,” she answered, looking up with resolution. “But tomorrow I shall call on Madame Travere and beg the use of some of her husband’s books.”

“What has inspired this sudden urge to study the law?” Monsieur Beaumont asked.

“It is not the law itself, but rather Monsieur Travere’s essays upon the principles of legality I am interested in,” Marion replied. “You see, I have been confronted with my own ignorance on the subject and I wish to rectify it.”

Monsieur Beaumont smiled. “Your curiosity, my dear,” he said. “Leads you down surprising paths, but it’s contributions to your education has been invaluable.”

Marion smiled back and resumed her dinner with restored cheerfulness.

…

Madame Travere was more than willing to share with her friend her husband’s publications. Monsieur Travere was an accomplished lawyer and his wife was a very good friend of Marion’s. They had known each other since they were quite young.

Monsieur Travere had married his wife for her quick tongue rather than the symmetry of her face and it was a great pleasure to him to discuss with her whatever subject he was writing on at the moment. Therefore she was very able to instruct Marion and explain to her those concepts that she could not comprehend on her own.

Marion left her friend with a mind full of the philosophy of law and with a renewed confidence in her own opinions on the subject.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I sincerely hope I have not taken the psalm I used in this chapter out of context, as I am not very familiar with the Catholic faith myself.
> 
> There really was a [doctor Piorry](https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Adolphe_Piorry) at l'hôpital de la charité, sadly I couldn't find any surgeons that specialized in back injuries.


	3. Part Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which morality is discussed and Javert makes an effort.

Contrary to what might be expected, when Marion returned to the hospital it was not with a collection of essays on legalism and the moral foundations of an independent system of law. It had not been her business to prepare an attack. She had merely meant to improve her ideas so she would be a better conversational partner on the topic.

She had certainly overestimated the amount of information she supposed Javert’s convictions to be based on. He had never read with ease and most of his ideas came from the harsh education he had benefited from in his youth and his later training as a police officer. Any form of reflective thought he had always did his best to avoid, because this inevitably involved at least a partial questioning of authority.

However, there is not a lot a man confined to a bed can do, besides think. And where thought is ceaseless, reflections must intrude. So when Marion returned to Javert’s bedside she found a very different man than she had left at the end of her last visit. She found a man quite eager to talk, though obviously very uncertain as to how he should undertake this.

“I thank you for coming again, Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he greeted her, with as dignified a look as he could achieve.

“It is good to see you again, Inspector Javert,” she smiled. The nurse had told her that Monsieur Javert was an inspector of the first class and that they had informed the constabulary of his situation.

“I hope,” Javert said in a formal, but sincere voice. “That the time spent on me does not prevent you from attending to those patients in this establishment more deserving of your aid and attention.”

Marion sat down and repressed a smile. “Since our first meeting I have always concluded my visit with a visit to you,” she said. “To give us ample time for our book.” She neglected to say what she really thought: that there was not another patient present that seemed to her to be in more need of her attention than himself. “The nurse informed me a representative of the constabulary has visited you,” she said.

“That is correct,” Javert confirmed.

“They will be glad not to have lost you,” Marion smiled.

A silence met her, instead of the gratified answer that she had expected.

“Shall we choose a new book?” she suggested, a little hastily. “I have rather forced my last selection on you, this time you must certainly choose yourself.”

“If you do not find it impertinent, Mademoiselle,” Javert said. “I would wish to ask you the meaning behind some of the things you told me the last time we spoke.”

“Not at all, Monsieur,” Marion answered, rather pleased. “Do ask me.”

“What is it,” he asked gravely. “That you consider the goal of the laws of man and God alike, if it is not the righteousness I spoke of.”

“The laws of God and the laws of man are very different,” Marion said seriously. “Although the latter wish to base themselves on the first.”

Javert regarded her with great discomfort. He did not understand her meaning. And still less could he understand how her face was so calm and complacent, while stating as she did that the two kinds of laws he had always considered as one, were no such thing.

“The laws that flow from our constitution,” Marion carried on. “Cannot comprehend all that God has meant for human lives. They can only describe what men feel to be our rights and prohibit what men feel a society cannot allow. The laws of God are not written down, one cannot read them, they must be felt.”

“Felt!” exclaimed Javert.

“Do not blame me for my opinion, Monsieur,” Marion said earnestly. “And I beg you, do not direct me to that one book that I do not read so well as I should. I do not consider the Bible, in all its wisdom, as containing God’s law. Not in full.”

Javert could not speak.

Marion saw his distress and she blamed herself for upsetting a man who was by no means in the full possession of his strength, but she felt she must explain herself fully now.

“What is right and what is wrong in the eyes of God, must be what is called what is Good and what is Evil. These are grand concepts and they change their meaning in every situation of life. Still, I have always found that I felt myself to be right or wrong, whenever I undertook an action. Have you not felt the same?”

“Yes,” Javert admitted. “Until recently, I have.”

“Do you mean that your feelings have changed recently?” Marion asked.

“In the most terrible way imaginable,” Javert replied.

“To be sure,” Marion said compassionately. “It is painful to look back on previous actions and feel that what felt right then, your feelings now tell you to be wrong. But if men and women are not allowed to change their minds, how would we improve ourselves?”

“You believe that what is Right and what is Wrong will change with your fancy?” he reproached her.

“Not at all, Inspector,” Marion said warmly. “I believe that I have no alternative but to feel, think and judge what is Good every time the question arises and to live with the decision I make at that time. If I look back and find myself wrong, my consolation must be that I have always tried to do good, that I now know better than I once did and that in future I will strive to do good once more.”

Whatever feelings these words inspired in Javert, they could not fill his mind completely. For he was very aware that Marion’s eyes were fixed on him with such earnest compassion as he had never seen before. A woman like her, he thought, could not be evil. Her logic certainly seemed flawed to him and her conclusions dangerous. But his own logic and conclusions, once a source of pride and satisfaction, he could no longer call comprehensible either.

“I see you do not agree with me, Inspector,” Marion said softly. “And I fear I cannot defend my position any further. I can only say that I must believe that God, who knows our hearts, will not judge us if we did wrong, while all of our being believed we did what was right.” She smiled. “Just as I do not think the men charged with upholding the law will judge the starving thief as harshly as the cold-hearted extortionist.”

Javert closed his eyes, overcome with misery.

“I have distressed you further,” Marion said sorrowfully. “Do forgive me, Monsieur.”

He forced himself to look at her. “No, Mademoiselle,” he said. “I distress myself. Do not feel uneasy on my account.”

“I have certainly failed miserably in my object,” Marion said with a sad smile. “Which was to support your spirits.”

“You are mistaken, Mademoiselle,” Javert said, making an effort. “I am merely in need of rest.” He hesitated. “If you would come again some other time,” he added. “I would be very grateful.”

“Then I certainly will, Inspector,” Marion answered, rising as quietly as possible. “Good day to you.”

“Good day, Mademoiselle.”

Javert lay staring at the ceiling for a long time after she had gone. Mademoiselle Beaumont’s self-reproach had cut him deeply. She wished to support his spirits. She had endured his indifferent treatment of her and now she suffered his impertinent questions. A lady like her… The least he could do was try and collect his thoughts, give her some reward for her efforts. He would try.

…

“I do believe your visits to the hospital are doing you more harm than good lately,” Monsieur Beaumont exclaimed later that day.

“Oh, Papa,” Marion sighed. “I fear they do harm to more than myself.”

“Come now, my dear,” her father said soothingly. “Sit by me and explain.”

Marion sat down by her father and told him all about the nameless man that had been rescued from the river. How he had not spoken, how she had read to him, how he had told her his name and how she had tried ever since to introduce new ideas to him. Ideas that might support instead of depress and that might alleviate his suffering.

Monsieur Beaumont listened to his daughter with quiet attention. He had long ago been forced to admit to himself that his daughter was no longer a little girl. However, whenever she was in the flow of strong emotions, he could not see her as anything else. He would always endeavour to comfort her, but to the woman she was now, comfort without explanation was worth very little.

“Have you considered, Marion,” he said finally. “That this depressed state of feelings may not have originated from this gentleman’s injury, but may actually be the cause of it?”

“What makes you think so?”  Marion enquired.

“Remember,” her father said gravely. “That there was no injury to the gentleman’s person other than might originate from a great fall and the near drowning in the very river they found him in.”

Marion looked at her father with a pained expression. “You mean to imply…” she began.

“It is very possible,” her father said. “That the inspector was not thrown in the river, but lost himself in it by design. Which must necessarily make his state of mind considerably harder to influence.”

Marion said nothing, she was looking down at her hands, which lay folded in her lap. Her life had not been as sheltered as that of most ladies from the higher middle class, but she had long felt that she knew very little of the hardships of life in general. The idea of someone taking their own life distressed her greatly. She thought of the man she had met in a hospital bed and thought of him looking to the cold river Seine as his only source of relief. She bowed her head even lower.

“I know, my dear,” her father said earnestly. “But do not let it discourage you, consider how remarkable his speaking so freely to you is, under these supposed circumstances.”

“That is true,” Marion admitted. She smiled at her father. “I shall not be discouraged.”

…

Indeed, Marion had every reason to feel encouraged when she next visited Javert, for he made an effort to show her she had not spoken to him in vain. He was more communicative and seemed calmer than she had ever found him. Still, she did not dare talk about morality again and therefore she proposed to read to him again. He agreed, but before they had chosen a book Marion happened to mention that she had borrowed one of them from her brother. This lead Javert to ask after her family and Marion, who was very fond of her brothers, proceeded to talk about them for quite some time.

“Philippe travels a great deal,” she said sorrowfully. “But he is distinguishing himself, which is what he wanted.”

“It is important to a man that he should be active,” Javert said by way of reply.

“Very true,” Marion smiled. “My eldest brother Luc lives not far from Papa and me, with his wife and children, which rather fixes him in Paris.”

“A man may be active without travelling,” Javert suggested.

“Also very true,” Marion replied.

After a while she asked Javert after his own family, suggesting his relations probably did not live close by.

“I am afraid I have no family to speak of,” Javert answered shortly.

“Forgive me,” Marion said. “It was an impertinent question.”

Javert could not bear the expression on her face and in an attempt to remove it, he said: “I will not trouble you with my own family history, it is not worth your notice.”

“But I should very much like to hear it,” Marion protested. “If you would not object to telling me.”

Javert looked at her open face and sighed. “The truth of the matter is,” he said. “Is that I was born in a prison, to a fortune-teller whose husband was in the prison galleys.”

A very heavy silence followed. Javert could not bear to look at Marion’s face, fully expecting her to be disgusted.

“I am afraid to speak for fear of offending you,” Marion finally broke the silence.

“Offending me,” Javert spoke incredulously. “There is nothing you could say that would do so.”

“Then let me express my admiration for the hard work that must have brought you to your present position,” Marion said earnestly. “I can only imagine…” She shook her head and sank into silence.

Javert did not speak either, but he watched her with wonder. He had himself always been proud of his accomplishments, but his parentage was a shameful secret to him that he guarded well. His confession seemed not to have sunk him in Mademoiselle Beaumont’s esteem, however, quite the reverse.

“Well,” Marion said after a long time. “Now we must really choose a book or we shall never begin.”

A book was chosen and she read to him once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I based Marion's ideas on morality and law mainly on my own personal ideas and some reflections on the Christian doctrine, but luckily my Brick-reading sister informs me that it fits rather well with Victor Hugo's ideas.


	4. Part Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert's body is healing in spite of himself.

Eight weeks had passed since Javert’s first admission to the hospital and the doctors started talking of fitting him with leg braces. They were quite confident he would be able to walk again. Javert did not know whether to hope or not, or what there was to hope for.

His superiors had expressed a wish of him remaining an inspector, if this was at all possible. He doubted very much, however, if he could ever wear his uniform again in good conscience. Even if his body recovered completely, which he himself did not expect, he could in no way imagine himself discharging the same duties he had so fanatically pursued before.

…

To say that Monsieur Beaumont thought about Inspector Javert with the same frequency as his daughter would be absurd. He was present in his thoughts, however, if only because he could very clearly see how much he was on the mind of Marion. Monsieur Beaumont was a sensible man and having retired as soon as his trade had procured him a very comfortable fortune, as was the fashion for the middle classes, it was his delight to collect about him people that combined sense with strength of feeling. To his daughter he had been a more liberal father than to his sons, because she reminded him so of his dear wife. His sons, however, had never felt any reproach towards him and loved and respected him just as much as Marion could do.

In short, Monsieur Beaumont was a good man and in many ways an even better father, and all this lead him to express to Marion a wish of meeting “the very interesting Inspector Javert.” Marion was pleased with this notion and promised to propose it when they next visited the hospital together.

 

So it was that during her next visit, after having read to Javert for a while, Marion broke a short silence after a chapter with the following:

“If you would allow it, Inspector, my father would like to pay you a visit.”

“I would be honoured,” Javert answered immediately. He felt he could not be excused if he did not pay deference to the man whose daughter had brought him such relief.

Marion went to fetch her father, but when Monsieur Beaumont appeared he was alone. He bowed by way of greeting and sat down in the chair so lately occupied by his daughter.

Javert had expected Monsieur Beaumont to be quite the gentleman and he found him to be exactly that. He was a complete ten years Javert’s senior, but certainly did not look it. He dressed well, but not very finely, which was unusual for a Frenchman in his position. A great deal less, however, would have been enough to command Javert’s respect as he had always been rather intimidated by what he considered gentility.

“I must thank you, Monsieur,” Javert said gravely.

“There really is no need,” Monsieur Beaumont replied, in a tone of voice not unlike his daughter’s.

There was a short silence.

“My daughter has spoken very highly of you,” Monsieur Beaumont said after a while.

“She is a very generous lady,” Javert replied, feeling greatly embarrassed. It as far worse, he thought, to be in such a position as he was while facing another man.

“I understand you are an inspector of the first class,” Monsieur Beaumont continued.

“I was,” Javert answered.

“Was?” Monsieur Beaumont replied. “Do you mean you do not wish to resume your post, should you recover?”

“I do not see how I can,” Javert replied.

Monsieur Beaumont gave him a serious, but mild look. “You must forgive my daughter, Inspector,” he said. “If she has related to me some part of what you might have meant to tell her in confidence. I can assure you she shared it with no one else. But from what I have heard you are a man in a moral crisis.”

Javert did not answer.

“I have also heard you spoken of, by others, as a very talented and respected member of the constabulary,” Monsieur Beaumont continued. “I should think it a great loss if you left your profession before it has been able to benefit from your recent…philosophical development.”

“Benefit!” Javert exclaimed. “Could I be justified in returning to my post without any of the convictions that carried me through my duties when I last held it?”

“Inspector,” Monsieur Beaumont said solemnly. “You could not be justified in failing to do so.”

Javert swallowed.

“You are a man of honour,” Monsieur Beaumont said resolutely. “And you suffer now because you believe yourself to have been unjust. I urge you to return to your work as soon as may be, and to carry out your duties in a way that you now believe to be just.”

His language, though spoken in a different manner, mirrored that of Marion and it moved Javert.

They talked for a few minutes and Javert felt a great deal of respect for Monsieur Beaumont, who seemed to him a serious and conscientious man. Their calm conversation was put to an end by the entrance of Marion. Javert was struck by her appearance, as she was now without her apron, and instead clad in cape and bonnet. The blue silk lining of her bonnet framed her face. She smiled.

“Ah, Marion,” Monsieur Beaumont said. “I see you are ready to go.”

She gave a gentle nod.

“Then I must take my leave, Inspector,” he said to Javert with a bow. “I sincerely hope we shall meet again.”

“That feeling is mutual,” Javert replied. He glanced at Marion and she gave him a most gratified smile.

“Good day, Inspector Javert,” she said.

“Good day, Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he replied with a nod.

Javert felt a little easier. He felt more justified in looking forward to Mademoiselle Beaumont’s visits now he had met her father. Monsieur Beaumont was a respectable man with good morals and informed opinions. If he approved of his daughter’s spending time with him, it could not be wrong.

…

“I am glad you have come just now, Mademoiselle,” Nurse Comtois greeted Marion. “Are you at liberty to speak to Inspector Javert?”

“Of course,” Marion said, hastily tying on her apron. “He has not taken a turn for the worse?”

“Oh no, Mademoiselle,” the nurse quieted her fears. “The doctor has fitted him with leg braces, but it has dampened his spirits so badly he has not spoken since.”

Marion went into the ward with a worried look and she found Inspector Javert sitting up in bed, staring blankly into the distance. “Good afternoon, Inspector,” she said softly.

“Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he said, starting. “Good afternoon.”

“May I sit down?” she asked.

He nodded his agreement.

Marion sat down and folded her hands in her lap. “Shall we read?” she asked.

“Forgive me,” Javert said. “But I feel I could not give your reading the attention it deserves.”

“Is there something else that commands your attention?” Marion enquired.

Javert was silent.

“We need not read,” Marion said. “Or even talk. I shall leave you if you so wish, but I shall sit in silence if that is more agreeable to you.”

Javert looked at her. She smiled. He gave a small nod, not knowing what else to do.

Marion sat very straight, hands folded, gazing thoughtfully at the curtain on the far side of Javert’s bed. She made no attempt to speak again. Whenever Javert looked at her for a longer time she met his gaze and smiled, but she did not break the silence.

“The doctors tell me I shall walk again,” Javert said in a broken voice, not able to bear her patience any longer.

Marion looked at him.

“But these braces… To walk with crutches… A man cannot subject to such humiliation.” Javert’s voice failed him and he looked away.

“Is it a humiliation to overcome against all odds?” Marion said quietly.

“I do not deserve to overcome them,” Javert said suddenly. “There is blood on my hands. Blood of those who were not innocent, but who were good nonetheless. God knows this.”

“Then God must forgive you!”

Javert looked at Marion and saw a fierceness in her eyes he had not expected.

“He must,” she said, lowering her voice.

She looked away, as she was sure there were tears in Javert’s eyes he could not wish her to see. She knew Inspector Javert must have kept the peace during the riots that had plagued Paris of late and had probably been forced to witness the rebellion first hand.

“I know very little,” Marion said in almost a whisper. “Of war or rebellion…” She bowed her head and continued: “So I cannot know the full meaning of your words…but…” Her eyes met Javert’s and she looked at him pleadingly. “Heaven would be empty if God did not forgive us for the things that we are ourselves ashamed to recall.”

Had Javert been able to speak he would not have known what to say. A silence fell that lasted some minutes.

“I will pray that you will walk again, Inspector,” Marion said, raising her head.

“I thank you,” Javert answered, barely audible.

…

From that day on Javert no longer fought his crutches. He did everything in his power to improve in strength and conviction. Marion visited him regularly, sometimes accompanied by her father, and both were impressed with his improvements.

Javert never requested Marion to sit in silence again, but neither did he speak of death and blood. With Monsieur Beaumont he once discussed the tragedy of casualties that must accompany almost every act of violence and the damage more than to the victims alone. But to Marion, whose face always brightened when he spoke of any signs of further recovery, he never mentioned such a subject again.

…

Javert felt his hard work well rewarded when he traded in his crutches for a cane. Everywhere he met with surprised congratulations on his remarkable recovery, everywhere except in Marion. Her congratulations were accompanied by no other emotion than delight.

“Soon you shall be free of this place forever,” she said, concluding her heartfelt wishes.

“I shall forever be grateful that the hospital opened its doors to a man who might have died without ceremony,” Javert said. “And to you, Mademoiselle Beaumont, for all you have done for me.”

“It is the doctors and nurses that should receive your thanks,” Marion shook her head.

“And they shall receive it,” Javert answered.

In his mind he admitted them only the credit of saving his body, however, while to Mademoiselle Beaumont he attributed the recovery of his mind. This he could never have expressed, of course. Too much had been said by him already that was improper, to say the least.

He was not aware that Marion was no less guilty of repressing thoughts she dearly wished to express. It was hard for her to think of Inspector Javert leaving the hospital without feeling some regret. To not know how his recovery progressed would be a trial to her and she knew it was one she must submit to. Her goodbye to him was as warm as ever and his was more expressively spoken than usual.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leg braces made from iron (or wood) and leather were used to keep partially paralized legs straight and unmoving so they could support weight. They often prevented the knee from being bent and were very uncomfortable. By the 1830's there were some pretty good one's though and they afforded disabled people more freedom of movement.


	5. Part Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert leaves the hospital and pays a visit to Monsieur Beaumont.

Javert left the hospital unassisted. He was followed by a boy in charge of carrying his things, but he walked alone. He leaned heavily on his cane and every step still took from him the greatest of effort, but he walked. Upon arriving at his lodgings he was greeted by his old housekeeper with respectful congratulations.

“Thank you, Madame Bisset,” he answered stiffly. “If you would collect my luggage from this boy and pay him for his services.”

He made his way to the drawing room as if to inspect it, unwilling to admit that the braces on his legs hurt him so that he was forced to sit down. The feelings of Javert at this very moment were very difficult to describe, due to their complexity, but to his surprise he felt at least some comfort in being at home again. The familiar, neat surroundings of his lodgings and the silent, respectful attentions of Madame Bisset pleased him. As soon as he had the strength, he decided, he would pay a visit to the prefect of police.

…

The doctors had been correct in their assessments, however optimistic they may have appeared at the time. Javert's recovery was remarkable quick. It was not to be supposed he would ever be able to walk without his leg braces, but he was soon able to walk with only relatively minor use of his cane. This was a matter of pride to him, because he could not bear to have the appearance of an invalid. Still, acknowledging to himself that he must at least partly be considered as one had one advantage: it taught him to think no more of Mademoiselle Beaumont.

For some time now Javert had been forced to admit to himself that he thought of her with equal admiration and esteem. Her face, which in unguarded moments would sometimes be called forward from his memory in very accurate detail, was dear to him. Just as her expressions on his person or his views had long been a comfort to him.

This would not do. He blamed himself for daring to even think of a woman whom he considered a young lady of a very genteel background. Still, his guilt could not prevent his thoughts. The best he could do was to convince himself that she would certainly not think of him. She had met him as a patient, he grimly reminded himself, and she must think of him as nothing but an invalid. A person in need of her charity and kindness because of his physical suffering and inferior position to herself. These thoughts were painful to him, but he admitted that pain gladly, for he felt it a just punishment for his own folly.

Still, he was very aware of the claim to his gratitude that both Mademoiselle and Monsieur Beaumont had and he thought it was right to pay the latter a visit. A short visit, to pay his respects, would be the proper thing to do.

 

Thus convinced, Javert called on Monsieur Beaumont at his home at his earliest opportunity.

Monsieur Beaumont was very pleased when his maid announced the arrival of an Inspector Javert and met him with great cordiality.

“You are very welcome, Inspector,” he said. “I am glad to see reports of your recovery were by no means exaggerated.”

“Indeed they were not,” Javert agreed as he sat down. “I have come to express my gratitude for the kind treatment I received from you and your daughter.”

“Think nothing of that,” Monsieur Beaumont said earnestly. “But do tell me of your present situation.”

“The prefect of police,” Javert said. “Joins me in my conviction that I could no longer perform the duties required on an inspector.”

Monsieur Beaumont looked grave, but Javert continued. “I have not so far regained my strength, nor do I believe I ever will, to be able to ensure the safety of myself and my fellows should I resume my former work.”

“That is unfortunate,” Monsieur Beaumont said. “But perhaps not unreasonable.”

Javert gave him a short nod. “I have, however,” he said with considerably pride. “Been offered the occupation of overseeing the running of the Conciergerie.”

This pleased Monsieur Beaumont exceedingly. “And do you have a mind to accept?” he asked.

“I believe I do, Monsieur,” Javert replied. “I have long felt there are decided improvements to be made in the day-to-day routines that mark the Conciergerie’s state of affairs.”

“Excellent,” Monsieur Beaumont replied, with great satisfaction. “Allow me to congratulate you on this very advantageous, if somewhat unexpected, progression of your career.”

“Thank you, Monsieur,” Javert said, with equal satisfaction.

For a while they sat together, spending their time in pleasant conversation. Javert was impressed with Monsieur Beaumont’s house. It was large, well fitted up and the study where he had received him was very fine. But it was fine in regards to comfort and elegance. There was no rich display of grandeur. The servant girl who had opened the door to him had been unassuming and Monsieur Beaumont himself was so easy that Javert did not feel himself at all as intimidated as he had expected to be. When he rose to take leave, however, he was given a shock, for Monsieur Beaumont protested against his going.

“Do let me persuade you to stay for supper, Inspector,” he urged him. “I assure you your presence would be very welcome to me.”

“I would not wish to trespass on your hospitality,” Javert protested in turn.

“It would be no such thing,” Monsieur Beaumont assured him. “Indeed, my daughter will be sorely disappointed to hear she has missed you.”

“Of course I would never want to give pain in any form to Mademoiselle Beaumont,” Javert answered, hiding the painfulness of his own feelings. “But I really cannot stay.”

“Perhaps,” said Monsieur Beaumont, convinced he would never hear the end of it if he had to tell his daughter Javert had called and left without seeing her. “You might take some refreshment with me now and wait a little longer, until my daughter has returned from her outing.”

“If that would please you, Monsieur,” Javert surrendered.

Refreshments were ordered and brought in by the servant girl.

“When your mistress returns,” Monsieur Beaumont told her in a friendly tone. “Tell her of my visitor and say I request her presence.”

“Certainly, Monsieur,” the girl answered, with the careful expression of someone who has studied hard to speak politely. With a curtsy she left the room.

 

It was not long before Marion’s approach was heard. When she appeared she was all smiling surprise. “Inspector Javert!” she said with obvious enjoyment.

“Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he said, rising and bowing immediately.

Marion curtsied and sat down by her father. “I cannot tell you how much it gratifies me to see you again,” she said earnestly. She thought he looked remarkably well and was very glad of it.

Javert’s thoughts were not very different, but they distressed him much more than Marion’s did her. He made a very civil reply and answered in the same style to her kind enquiries into his health. She listened attentively to his explanations concerning his new position and after assuring herself that he was pleased with it himself, congratulated him enthusiastically.

It was truly pleasing to Javert to see the interest his affairs excited in Mademoiselle Beaumont, but he did not think he should stay any longer. “I really must take my leave,” he said after a few minutes.

“So soon?” Marion said.

Monsieur Beaumont watched closely as Javert made his apologies and his daughter entreated him to stay longer. He had expected Marion to take great pleasure in seeing her patient again, but she seemed to him more eager than he was used to see her. It now occurred to him there was something rather embarrassed in the gentleman’s behaviour that he had not perceived before. Monsieur Beaumont’s thoughts were broken off, by Marion calling on him to join her in an invitation:

“But can I not persuade you to stay to dinner? I am sure Papa would wish it as much as myself.”

“I have already invited Monsieur Javert before your arrival, my dear,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled. “He assured me he could not stay long and he only waited to see you.”

“Ah,” Marion said, taken aback. “How kind of you to do so, Inspector.”

“Your father assured me it would give you pleasure,” Javert said stiffly. “And I would not wish to appear ungrateful.”

After Marion had assured him that paying her father a visit and taking the time to wait for her was more than their deserved thanks, Javert took leave of her and Monsieur Beaumont. He left their house with very uneasy feelings, but in time he recovered and was convinced he had acted well. His gratitude had been expressed, Monsieur and Mademoiselle Beaumont had been pleased and he had not overstayed his welcome. He would see them no more, in all probability. This thought certainly caused him to feel some regret, but he also felt it was proper and, moreover, inevitable.

When he left, he left Marion and her father sitting in silence for quite some time. The former engrossed in her thoughts, the latter observing his daughter carefully.

“It was very kind of him to call,” he observed to her after a while.

“Very kind,” Marion replied.

“Never have I seen a man so truly grateful,” he added.

“Indeed,” Marion said.

“Do you hear me at all, my dear?” he laughed.

Marion looked up in confusion.

“I am sorry, Papa,” she apologized. “My thoughts were elsewhere.”

“I am at all not convinced they were,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled.

…

When Marion paid her usual visit the hospital, she blamed herself for not doing so with as much enthusiasm as she had done before. She would not allow herself to slacken in her charitable duties and was very careful that she would show no loss of spirits. The truth was, however, that she was very sorry for moving in such different circles from Inspector - or now Monsieur she reminded herself - Javert. He was not very likely to be at the plays or concerts she went to. Neither did she expect to see him at the public gardens or the boulevard. She had hoped he would call on her father again, but she knew there was strictly no occasion for him to do so.

Why she wanted to see him she could not give a very satisfactory explanation for, even to herself. For the only one she could think of was not satisfactory at all. All in all, these thoughts were not conducive to the happy state of mind her father had come to expect from her and he was too observant to fail to notice the change.

 

“I think,” Monsieur Beaumont said one morning, folding up his newspaper. “That I shall pay a visit to my friend Judge Muscat at the Palais du Justice.”

Marin looked up from her book. “Might I come with you, Papa?” she asked, checking the eagerness in her voice.

“I had rather hoped you would, my dear,” he said smilingly.

Marion hurried off to fetch her bonnet. Other than that she felt no need for a change in dress. She was always simply dressed, only the cut of her gown and the fineness of the material betrayed her father’s income. She was in high spirits when she sat down in the carriage beside her father.

“Since Muscat and I will be talking on very dull and indifferent subjects,” her father said after a while. “I think it best that you should wait in the grand hall while I visit him.”

“Of course, Papa,” Marion said, hiding her smile.

“And if,” her father continued. “You happen to meet with Monsieur Javert while you are there, you are very welcome to invite him to dinner this Friday.”

Marion was too pleased to answer, but her father did not require a reply.

Upon entering the Palais du Justice some time was inevitably spent in admiring the architecture. Marion had never been there and it was a handsome building. At length Monsieur Beaumont left to visit his friend and Marion very quickly managed to ascertain in what general direction she would idly be strolling while waiting for her father. She no longer had the innocence of youth to attract voluntary offers of assistance, but her easy manners and refined appearance produced much the same effect. She was standing by a window and admiring some of the masonry when Javert emerged from one of the offices.

Any unattended woman would have caught his notice, but her air and dress immediately caught his eye and in spite of her bonnet partly concealing her face, he recognized her immediately.

“Mademoiselle Beaumont?” he spoke in surprise.

Marion turned round with a bright smile. “Indeed it is, good day,”

“Good day,” he said, drawing nearer. “What brings you here.”

“My father is visiting a friend,” Marion said cheerfully.

“I see, I hope he is well,” Javert said, feeling very uneasy.

“Very well, I thank you,” Marion smiled.

“And yourself?”

“Quite the same, thank you.”

She looked at him with the same high spirits she had shown when he had seen her last. “And how do you like your new post, Monsieur?” she asked. Before he could answer she laughed and added: “I am all in favour you know, because now I can call you Monsieur once more, just as I did when we first met.”

Javert bowed to her and said: “I am sure I would always welcome your notice of me, by whatever name you chose to address me.”

Marion’s face flushed and she gave him a happy nod. “So, does your new post please you, Monsieur Javert?” she repeated her question.

The warmth in her voice took Javert by surprise, he looked away in an attempt to hide his confusion. “Very well,” he answered gruffly. “It is very gratifying work.”

“I am pleased to hear that,” she said. “I truly am.”

They stood side by side. Javert was looking out of the window, trying to compose himself.

“My father and I were both very sorry you could not stay to dinner when you did us the honour of calling,” Marion said cautiously.

Javert felt he was master enough of himself now to look at her again, so he did.

Sufficiently encouraged by this she went on: “So if it would be convenient to you we would be very happy if you would be one of our guests at our supper party this Friday.”

“Thank you, Mademoiselle,” he said, taken by surprise once again. “I would be honoured.”

Javert watched Marion’s face as she told him how very happy she was and the general expression of delight that overtook her convinced him she meant every word of it. He felt a smile rise on his own face and Marion’s spirits rose even higher because of it.

She regarded him with growing admiration. He looked very well in his dark blue uniform and although he carried his cane, he touched it so lightly it seemed he hardly needed it. She realized he must be wearing his braces under his uniform, but she saw not a single sign of it.

“Monsieur Javert…?”

A young man called for Javert’s attention and gave an apologetic bow.

“It seems I am needed,” Javert excused himself.

“Of course,” Marion said. “Till Friday then.”

He bowed, but Marion held out her hand to him and said with the warmest expression imaginable: “Good day, Monsieur Javert.”

Javert touched her hand as lightly as he could. “Good day, Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he said, looking into her face. Then he resolutely turned round and walked away, leaning on his cane as little as possible.

Marion watched him go with glowing cheeks. When her father met her in the hall she was so improved in looks and spirits that whatever little doubts he might have had, faded away instantly.

“I take it Monsieur Javert accepted our invitation,” he said.

“He did,” Marion replied happily.

“Very good,” her father nodded.


	6. Part Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert attends a dinner party and Marion is made unsure of herself.

Monsieur Beaumont did not give big dinners. He held supper parties to which he only invited friends. He felt this was the prerogative of a man like him who had made his own fortune and was now dependent on no one. This Friday the guests consisted of his son Luc, his daughter-in-law Louise and Monsieur and Madame Travere.

Javert would make a very welcome fifth guest, but he certainly had the disadvantage of being a new addition to a party of old friends. When he arrived, the servant girl showed him to the drawing room, where Marion was the first to greet him.

“Monsieur Javert!” she exclaimed, holding out her hand.

He shook her hand with more conviction this time. “How do you do, Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he bowed.

“Come now,” she laughed, being in very high spirits. “There is no need for such formalities.”

Javert looked at her. The curls framing her face were more elaborate on this occasion and she was clad in a fine, wine-red gown. A great battle was lost inside the mind of Javert and he thought to himself that Marion Beaumont was the most beautiful woman he had ever had the pleasure of knowing.

Perceiving she had somewhat startled him Marion said smilingly: “I am very well, Monsieur, and yourself?”

He was saved from having to reply by the kind welcome of her father. They shook hands and he was immediately introduced to Luc Beaumont, the eldest son of the family.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Monsieur Javert,” Luc Beaumont told him.

“The pleasure is all mine, I assure you,” Javert said with a bow.

Luc Beaumont was nearing his forties, but he was handsome and would in all probability age as well as his father. His wife Louise Beaumont was a sweet-tempered woman of about Marion’s age. The introductions were barely made, or the maid announced the arrival of Monsieur and Madame Travere.

Madame Travere appeared first. She was a tall woman, still as beautiful in her thirties as she had been in her twenties and very finely dressed. Marion embraced her affectionately and called her “my dear Blanche.”

To Javert’s relief Monsieur Travere was a calm gentleman who introduced himself politely but formally and did the same for his wife. Javert watched Blanche Travere with some amazement. When released from Marion’s embrace she instantly clung to her husband, teasing him in a sweet and loving manner and reproaching him for imaginary offences she instantly forgave him for. Monsieur Travere, who was considerably older than his wife, seemed very well pleased with whatever she said and did not often feel the need to reply.

Javert’s mind was in a great tumult, but he had no opportunity to try and calm it. Hardly a moment passed when he did not feel Marion’s eyes fixed on him. She was performing her role as hostess with much flair and soon called everyone to supper. They were waited on by the maid, with some assistance from Geraud the manservant.

Javert found himself seated between Luc and Marion Beaumont. To his relief Blanche Travere kept much of Mademoiselle Beaumont’s conversation to herself. He found a certain pleasure in eating silently while listening to their animated conversation and contented himself with smiling at Marion whenever she looked at him, which was rather often. After a while Luc Beaumont asked him if he, as a man of the law, expected there to be more riots.

“Not at present,” Javert answered. “But I fear it will be some time yet until peace will come to stay in Paris.”

Luc Beaumont nodded gravely. “It is a troublesome thought,” he said. “And yet… some of France’s greatest victories were born from riots.”

“I have seen too much of the violence, to condone rebellion,” Javert said sharply. “But…I have also seen too much to condemn it.”

Luc Beaumont heard the feeling in his voice and entered into an earnest conversation with him. Their doing so drew the notice of Monsieur Travere, who joined in with some observations on the revision of the constitution.

 “Politics!” exclaimed Madame Travere. “Dear Marion, do your duty as lady of this house and remind these men that such a topic is prohibited.”

“What would you have us talk on, ma chère,” Monsieur Travere said, his voice was all calmness, but there was a laughter hidden in his eyes. “Art, religion, love?”

“That is all the same topic, mon cher,” his wife replied. “At any rate I do not care what you talk of, as long as it isn’t politics.”

“All the same topic?” Luc exclaimed. “What can you mean by that, Madame.”

“That art, religion and love are all very much the same thing, simply viewed from a different perspective," she said.

“They certainly have much to do with one another,” Marion spoke. “But I cannot say I have ever seen them as one and the same.”

“Art may often be connected to religion,” Monsieur Beaumont considered. “Just as it is very closely connected to love, if only because of its subject matter.”

“But can the love for one’s God be compared to the love of romance?” Monsieur Travere said laughingly. “I think not.”

“To love another person is to see the face of God,” Louise Beaumont said in her gentle voice, that had not been heard for a while.

Luc Beaumont smiled at his wife and said with genuine affection: “There, my wife has solved it all for us.”

“That is a lovely thought, Louise,” Marion said with a sigh.

“I must not pretend it to be a creation of my own,” Louise Beaumont said. “I daresay I read it somewhere.”

“Then it is a lovely memory,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled at his daughter-in-law.

Javert looked at Marion and her lovely, glowing face. He was glad the noise of conversation soon filled the dining room once more.

After supper, when Monsieur Travere engaged the conversation of his wife, Marion contrived to sit beside Javert once more.

“I am afraid I have neglected you at dinner,” she said.

“Not at all,” he assured her.

“Has my brother not overwhelmed you with his lively chat?” Marion asked. She was not truly worried, but was aware that some of her brother’s opinions might not be to Javert’s taste.

“He paid me the compliment of an honest discussion,” Javert answered and he meant it.

“I am glad,” Marion said.

“Do you share your friend’s distaste of politics?” he asked.

“It is a subject which must make me nervous,” Marion said with a laugh. “And I suspect that is also the origin of Madame Travere’s distaste.” She smiled. “It is interesting that she has no such distaste to the subject of the law, while to some people those two subjects might be considered very close.”

“Closer perhaps than art and religion,” he suggested with a slight smile.

“Indeed, or love,” Marion answered.

They both fell silent.

“If I remember some of your former speeches correctly,” he said without lifting up his eyes. “Religion and love must be very closely related to you.”

Marion made an effort to catch his eye before she answered: “Indeed they are.”

Another silence.

“Marion!” Luc disturbed both their thoughts. “Can I entreat you to sing for us?”

Marin glanced at Javert and seemed uncertain.

“I am sure Monsieur Javert would very much like to hear you sing,” Luc urged.

“Indeed I would,” Javert hastily agreed.

“Come, my dear,” Madame Travere called from the piano forte. “I shall play and you shall sing.”

Madame Travere played well. Neither Marion nor Louise played well enough by comparison to her to wish to exhibit, but they both sang very well. So the two sisters sang a duet while their friend played their accompaniment. They were listened to with admiration and smiles by all the men. Javert’s feelings were perhaps not so very different to those of the married gentlemen, but certainly less satisfactory on the whole.

With talk and music, the rest of the evening passed away and when it drew to a close, carriages were ordered. A hackney coach arrived for Javert and he took leave of the remaining party.

“Good evening, Monsieur Javert,” Marion said holding out her hand. “I do wish to see you again soon.”

“Good evening, Mademoiselle,” he said, pressing her hand.

She gave a slight sigh and smiled as he turned from her and walked out the door. He did not look up until he was seated in his carriage, blaming himself for nearly every thought that entered his head.

…

Javert’s thoughts, as he made his way home, were certainly not very pleasant. They mainly dwelt on how inadequate his talents were in regards to pleasing a well-bred woman. His life, he thought, had been very insufficient to supply him with either conversation or accomplishments that would make him good company. He had always lived free of vices, but equally free of amusement or society. To be self-denying and respectable had been the beginning and end of his private life.

Mademoiselle Beaumont had spoken of theatres, of drinking lemonade in the park. In his mind’s eye he saw her still at the dinner table, laughing and making others laugh by turns. And yet…he had overheard Madame Travere chide her:

“You were never a very good friend to have at a ball, even in your first season you were never fond of dancing.”

“I was fond enough of dancing,” Marion had answered. “I was not fond of the reasons my partners had for wishing to dance with me.”

He had often wondered why she had not married. At first he had supposed Monsieur Beaumont had not wished it for her, since her keeping his house must add considerably to his comfort. Having seen more of the gentleman, however, Javert could no longer imagine him to have such an opinion. This meant that it must be Mademoiselle Beaumont’s own disinclination that had kept her from finding a husband. Sometimes he did think there must be some disappointed love in her past, but her high spirits and lively cheerfulness made that seem rather unlikely.

In any case, he thought gloomily, as he arrived at his lodgings. To him it could make no difference whether she was married or not, he would be equally unable to be pleasing company to her in either case.

…

Javert was mistaken, of course, in supposing the only powers of pleasing a woman lie in high-spirited conversation or in professing to like the very things she amuses herself with. Admittedly, had Javert met with Marion Beaumont at eighteen, he might have found it difficult to command her attention for very long. Marion Beaumont as she was at present, however, was a great deal more pleased with him than he could have imagined. He was not as well educated as herself, but he was a man of the world. He had struggled, fought and overcome. She was convinced of him possessing an honourable heart and a noble soul and she was very willing to overlook the stiffness of his manner and the formality of his address. When he could be persuaded to talk, either of his work or his own history, he was always assured of her attention and interest.

The fact that she had met him when he was an infirm and depressed man, was also not the drawback Javert supposed it to be. A person that is suffering will always be interesting and in her eagerness to be of assistance to him Marion had fixed her mind on Javert in a way she would never have done with a man in normal circumstances. Being able to compare what he had been on their first meeting, only made her value his present state of mind and body more highly. Furthermore, it was flattering to her to recall their intimate conversations at the hospital, when she saw him speak with great reserve and decorum to everybody around him. His evident gratitude was even more flattering, considering the kind of man she thought he was. When one adds to this that Javert held her father’s good opinion and that Marion had seen him in uniform, it is perhaps no longer surprising that she was altogether really charmed by him.

…

Javert certainly did not suspect he was gratifying feelings other than his own when he decided to go to the park that Sunday after mass. For the first time in his life he walked amongst the crowd of finely dressed pleasure bound people who were drinking, chatting and sometimes dancing. Dressed in his Sunday best as he was, Javert still looked sober compared to the other men, young and old alike. He did not envy them. Finery, he thought, could only serve to impress those not truly worth impressing.

It was not long before he recognized Mademoiselle Beaumont sitting at a table with her father and a gentleman unknown to him. He observed her for a while, not knowing whether he should go up to speak to her. There was an empty chair beside her and she seemed not to be taking part in her father’s conversation with the gentleman. Neither was she observing the promenading young people or watching the nearby dance, to all appearances she was deep in thought.

Javert thought that for a lady as lively as she sometimes was, she was certainly serious as well. Eventually he did walk over to her, meaning only to greet her in passing by. This resolve he could not keep, however, because on perceiving him Marion’s face lit up with a brilliant smile. She instantly rose and put out her hand to him, making her father and his friend rise also.

“Good afternoon, Monsieur Javert,” she said warmly as he shook her hand.

“Good afternoon, Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he nodded, greeting her father and the gentleman, who introduced himself as Monsieur Firmin.

“Will you not sit down?” Marion invited, taking her seat again and Javert joined her party.

Marion poured him a glass of wine and as her father resumed his conversation with Monsieur Firmin, she fixed all her attention on him.

It might have been the wine, the music in the air or the afternoon sunshine, but Javert quite forgot himself as he talked to her. They talked of the niceness of the weather and the great number of people. Then Javert asked Marion if she had gone to mass.

“Of course, Monsieur,” Marion said feelingly. “If you doubt the likelihood of my going I hope you would not suspect my father of allowing it!”

Javert had not meant expected his speech to be misunderstood in this way. “I suspect you nor your father,” he assured her. “Forgive me, I have offended you.”

“If you did the feeling is forgotten already,” Marion smiled. To prove to him she had indeed attended she talked to him of the sermon.

Javert listened to her with interest, but the subjects she mentioned, however close to his heart, still hardly reached his ear. He was thinking of Mademoiselle Beaumont sitting in church, listening quietly or singing hymns, all with the same lovely face. Free of any fear of God, assured of nothing but love and grace.

Marion, not knowing why he had gone so quiet, changed the subject and asked him if his time in the hospital had taught him to enjoy a novel.

He confessed that some books of that description had lately entered his house. “But I fear my own reading does not do them justice,” he said.

“If your enjoyment is involved in their reading I cannot suppose any novel would feel itself ill-used,” she said, laughingly.

Javert smiled. “You understand the feelings of novels, do you?” he said.

“It was you who spoke of their feeling of justice,” Marion retorted.

His smile widened. “Now you misunderstand me purposely,” he said.

“Let us talk of other amusements then,” Marion laughed. “Do you approve of the theatre?”

Javert could not say. He had not been to any performance since he had been a very young man. “I am disposed to approve of any enjoyment of yours,” he answered, condemning his own ignorance.

Marion was truly flattered, however, and laughed: “That is praise worth receiving!”

The smile returned to his face.

“What think you of music?” Marion continued, determined to take this opportunity of further studying his character. She felt she knew a good deal of his ideas, but rather little of his habits.

“I am fond of the art,” he replied. “But have rarely the opportunity to enjoy it, nor have I studied it as you must have.”

Marion laughed again. “Do not repeat that conviction to my father,” she said. “Or he will be forced to tell you how I fled from my instrument at any opportunity I had.”

She shook her head. “I am sorely lacking in discipline.”

Not very long ago these words would have shocked and possibly repulsed Javert, but now he merely smiled. “The art of song you must have studied,” he said. “I have heard you sing with great skill, so you will not deny it.”

Marion was gratified to hear something of pleasantry in his voice and her flattered smile prevented Javert from blaming himself for such a speech. “I dearly love to sing,” she said.

“It is evident from your performance,” he said with a bow of his head.

“My father and I shall attend a concert this Friday fortnight,” Marion said, grown courageous because of his way of expressing himself. “The music will be good and if you were at liberty it would give me great pleasure to see you there.”

“I cannot say-” he began hesitantly.

“Pray do not apologize,” Marion entreated. “Your time is a valuable commodity, I know.”

As she smiled Javert wished himself a younger man, but Marion said archly:

“Should you attend, however, I insist upon you finding me to tell me if by comparison my singing can still be called great.”

“If that would please you,” he said, smiling in spite of himself. “But I believe you very well know the answer, Mademoiselle.”

“You flatter me, Monsieur,” Marion said, immensely pleased.

Javert felt it had been a mistake to speak in so unguarded a manner, but he could not be grave when she was smiling. He took leave of her as soon as he had convinced himself that he should. Even then he was not allowed to leave before her father had joined her in her wishes to see him at the concert.

Walking away slowly, not aware that Marion was watching him as long as she could, he decided it had been pleasant to talk to her again, but that he would certainly not go to the concert. It was frivolous. His new position paid a higher salary than he was formerly used to, but there was really no need to begin spending freely now, when he had been frugal all his life.

“Do you think Monsieur Javert will attend the concert, Papa?” Marion asked, when Javert was out of sight.

“I daresay he will, my dear,” her father answered.

“I am afraid he will not,” Marion shook her head. “I do not think he will consider it worth his while.”

Monsieur Firmin laughed. He was an old friend of her father’s and in every way a grey-haired gentleman. “My dear Mademoiselle Marion,” he said with the familiarity of one who remembered her in pigtails. “If I were as young as Monsieur Javert and you had asked me to find you at a concert, nothing could have prevented me.”

Marion coloured and shook her head.

“You need not look so coy,” Monsieur Firmin laughed. “I see what you are about and if your friend were not so serious a fellow he would see it too.”

Marion’s father looked at her earnestly and wisely contrived to call the attention of his friend away from her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to my French friend Sophie, my sister, and kind reader Groucha (over at Fanfiction.net) for helping me with some of the historical details of this story.


	7. Part Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert attends a concert and Marion's friend starts getting suspicious.

On a particular Friday not long after the afternoon in the park Javert found himself dressing for a certain concert. It took some time to settle in his mind why he was going. Finally he decided it was to give pleasure to Mademoiselle Beaumont. She had requested his presence, therefore he would go. The friendship she had shown him must be repaid. Friendship, he thought, was the correct term.

The thought of marriage had never been present in Javert’s life. Chastity, he had always found, was most creditable for an officer of the law. The distractions and temptations of life he had never allowed any power over him. Moreover, the idea of a wife was not compatible with his estimation of an inspector’s duties. A man could not be thinking of home when policing the streets, Javert thought gravely. And a husband in turn could not be excused in abandoning his wife. These thoughts and arguments were very familiar to Javert, but he found they no longer applied to him. He was still a civil servant, still a man of the law, but no longer one who took to the streets. His status had risen, while his inconveniences had sunk.

In a moment of weakness Javert pictured Marion Beaumont beside him. Then he glanced round his room, immaculate, sober, dark, and shook his head. He grabbed his cane and set out with an expression as grave as it ever had been.

…

Marion delighted in any live performance of the arts, be it singing, dancing or theatre. She also liked the bustle and warmth of a filled theatre or concert hall. In a crowd that had a stage to observe she could fancy herself quite unobserved while still enjoying the collective excitement of a large company of like-minded people.

Considering these feelings it was unusual for Marion to look about her as much as she did. Her father did not question her, nor did he try to assure her that Monsieur Javert would find her if he had chosen to come. He sat beside her in silence. Contemplating the peculiar feelings of a father that had never expected his daughter to marry, but that was now beginning to reconsidering this presumed fact of life.

There was leisure for greeting old friends and bowing to esteemed acquaintances before the concert properly commenced and Marion was interested in only one. Her father talked to some friends, but Marion was resolutely abstaining from any conversation until she saw Madame Travere come towards her.

“My dear Marion,” she said, kissing her cheek. “Whatever is the matter, you look quite flushed.”

“There is nothing the matter beyond me having waited for you for an absolute age,” Marion said hastily, knowing her friend would be content with such a flattering answer.

She was indeed and Marion did her best to attend to her friend’s conversation. At length everyone took their seats, as the entertainment was about to commence. Marion was sorely disappointed Javert had not come. It was lucky for her that there was music to fix her attention, so she could hide the severity of her feelings from herself and her company.

This was even more fortunate because of the fact that these feelings were wholly unnecessary. Javert _had_ come and he had seen her and looked at her with guilty admiration. However, he had not judged it right to go and speak to her at this time. He was afraid Mademoiselle Beaumont or her father would feel obligated to invite him to sit with them and such a situation he wished to avoid. He was very calmly waiting for the concert to start. Towards the crowds and the excitement in the air he was perfectly indifferent. He had been used to keeping the peace at gatherings of a similar size and even higher spirits.

Falling back into old habits, he spent the beginning of the concert surveying the room and it was some time before he remembered to attend to the music. When he remembered, however, he did enjoy it. The music was good, so were the singers and there was an elegance to the whole affair that was rather new but also rather pleasing to Javert. He could not observe Marion Beaumont from his chosen seat, because he had felt it wrong to choose a seat on such a motive. Now he was a little sorry for his prudence, because he imagined it might be something to witness Mademoiselle Beaumont’s delight in the music.

When the performers withdrew and the intermission began, there was a great bustle. Monsieur Beaumont and Monsieur Travere went in quest of refreshments, leaving the two ladies.

“Did you not enjoy it, my dear?” Madame Travere asked Marion. “It is very unlike you to be so dull.”

Marion was spared the trouble of feigning more cheerfulness than she felt, because at that very moment she saw Monsieur Javert moving towards her through the crowd. “You came after all, Monsieur!” she exclaimed and she put out her hand.

He took it, gratified by her warm reception and bowed to her friend. Madame Travere scarcely had time to smile and curtsy, for Marion was already eagerly enquiring of Javert how he liked the concert. She was delighted with whatever praise he chose to bestow on the performance.

“Now, Blanche,” she said. “Stand quite firm, for I shall force Monsieur Javert to tell us whether he shall persevere in calling _our_ performance at my father’s party excellent!”

Javert regarded her seriously and said with honest sincerity: “You must know yourself that the skill and talent displayed here must exceed yours, but I hope you will believe me when I assure you both that my enjoyment of your performance far exceeded the enjoyment I have experienced here, however great it may be.”

“What a shocking speech!” Madame Travere exclaimed laughingly. “Have you no idea how to flatter a lady?”

But Marion, despite knowing very well her friend was only speaking in jest, gave Javert a gentle smile and said: “I will believe you, Monsieur, and I will feel all the force of the compliment. If only because I am persuaded that you are a man that has never once sacrificed honesty to either idle gallantry or personal gain.”

This commendation struck Javert and he smiled, thinking that Mademoiselle Beaumont’s opinion must be all the more valuable since he had revealed to her so many of his personal struggles. Madame Travere was aware of the change in atmosphere and decided to stay silent and observe closely. Marion did not even notice her friend was displaying such uncharacteristic behaviour. Javert hardly even recollected her presence.

“Does the concert fulfil your expectations?” he asked.

“Completely,” Marion smiled. “I am very impressed with some of the songs, I shall be ordering the music at the first opportunity I have.”

“You make a point of maintaining a complete collection of music?” he asked.

“Oh no!” Marion said. “But I make a point of collecting about me what gives me enjoyment.”

“Music and books must be no small part of that collection,” Javert smiled.

“Indeed,” Marion said. “They comprise the chief of it I believe.”

Monsieur Travere and Monsieur Beaumont returned with refreshments and greeted Javert very pleasantly. Monsieur Beaumont expressed his particular enjoyment in seeing him at the long-awaited concert. There was no time for much more, for the concert was recommencing.

Now Madame Travere had an inspiration and said loudly to her husband: “You shall not make me close the row this time, my love! I cannot bear to be so in the way of distractions.”

And by resolutely passing by Marion and her husband and sitting down on his other side, she left Marion with an empty seat beside her. Suddenly overcome with some form of embarrassment Marion did not speak, however, and Javert was about to make his bow and leave when Monsieur Beaumont said:

“Will you not sit with us, Monsieur?”

“Please do,” Marion joined her father, having found her courage just in time.

Javert hesitated, but the united smiles of Mademoiselle and Monsieur Beaumont persuaded him to accept. He sat down beside Mademoiselle Beaumont, closing the row.

Now Marion’s enjoyment in the concert was indeed complete. In between songs she gave her opinion on the performance to Javert with great spirit and encouraged him to do the same. During the songs her eyes were fixed cheerfully on the musicians with such expressions of delight it would have made even the most conceited artist wonder.

Javert’s assumptions about witnessing Mademoiselle Beaumont’s delight were therefore confirmed in a perhaps somewhat misleading manner. This second half of the concert brought him a great deal more enjoyment than the first. Marion was an attentive companion, both in her silence and in her conversation. Between the music, Marion and the occasional pleasant remark from Monsieur Beaumont Javert had no attention left for doubts or feelings of impropriety. It was a happy concert indeed.

 “What a delightful concert,” Marion sighed after the musicians had all taken their bow.

“It was indeed,” Javert agreed.

In the noise and bustle of people rising from their seats and getting ready to leave there was not much opportunity for conversation and Monsieur Beaumont soon led his daughter away to their waiting carriage. This brought much more pain to Madame Travere however, than to Javert. Because he felt himself quite unable to name anything that could possibly improve this evening, while she was dying to question her friend on her very different behaviour during the second half of the concert. When she took leave of Javert she gratified at least part of her feelings by saying:

“I am sure we shall meet again very soon, Monsieur Javert.”

Javert was surprised, but he said something civil and bowed to her and her husband. When he walked out of the concert hall he had almost forgotten her speech already. He was too busy convincing himself that his feelings were quite calm and very natural. This was simply going into society. At his time of life and considering his new profession it was very fitting that he should employ his hours of leisure in a more social way. Yes, he thought, very fitting indeed. No one would feel the need to question his motives, so he should not either.

…

Whatever Madame Travere was thinking when she first saw Marion after the concert, she concealed her suspicions very well. “Have you yet made that order of music you spoke of at the concert?” she asked innocently.

“I have,” Marion said cheerfully. “I am expecting it to arrive shortly.”

“Very good,” Madame Travere nodded. “Then we shall have something new to practice with.”

After a while she added: “That serious Monsieur Javert, you met him at the hospital did you not?”

“Yes,” Marion replied cautiously.

“I thought he was a friend of your father’s,” Madame Travere remarked nonchalantly.

Marion made no reply.

Madame Travere was very surprised. She would have accepted indifference and she would have laughed at protestations, but silence… She had known Marion for a long time and this was very unlike her. “Forgive me,” she said. “I did not mean to pry.”

“Blanche, prying is to you what breathing is to most others,” Marion said gently. “And I do not blame you for it, but I had rather not talk about Monsieur Javert.”

“Of course,” Madame Travere said meekly.

There was a short silence.

“Would you allow _me_ to talk about him instead?” she said after a while, wishing to make amends.

“If you must,” Marion said, struggling to hide both her embarrassment and her growing distress.

Monsieur Frimin’s jokes had made her realize how unsure she was of Javert’s feelings towards her. Her own feelings had been getting gradually stronger until it was very hard for her to call them anything else but love. She was not ashamed of these feelings, but they had rather taken her by surprise. Now she was doing everything in her power to prevent herself falling deeper in love with a man she was by no means convinced would ever consider admitting a woman into his life.

“I simply wished to say that I approve of him,” Madame Travere said.

Marion glanced at her.

“I would approve of anyone that you liked, Marion,” Madame Travere said seriously. “But from what I have seen of him he seems a most dependable and respectable man.”

Marion nodded silently.

Madame Travere smiled encouragingly and left it at that. She was not entirely sure what was so upsetting to her friend. She had never seen her in love, but had to conclude that something like love must be at play here. Now she hoped very much she would indeed see Monsieur Javert again soon, because she was determined to get to know him better. She was not aware that her conversation with Marion would probably prevent her from seeing him again as soon as she desired. Marion was now certain that her behaviour was awakening the suspicions of her family and friends.

“I cannot carry on in this way,” she told herself. “If he wishes to see me, he will visit, I must not be seen to go out of my way to meet him.”

Having made this resolve, she went about her usual business and did not speak of Javert to either her father or Madame Travere. Monsieur Beaumont was surprised, but he was unwilling to force his daughter into a confession of her feelings. His daughter did not appear unhappy to him and because he was unaware of how much exertion it cost Marion to maintain this appearance, he thought it best to leave her in peace.

…

Javert had by now firmly settled into his new post at the Conciergerie. Having ensured himself of the approbation of his superiors and the respect of his subordinates, he was now taking the necessary steps to ensure the improvements he had long thought indispensable. His steadfast conviction and forceful arguments met with very little opposition and where there was opposition it did not last long. The changes he wished to see were made and he was commended for them. Although he did not credit much of the admiration he received for his work, Javert was pleased with himself and his endeavours. Corruption, negligence and inefficiency were his enemies and he was convinced he would triumph over them all in time.

The lack of information or invitations from the Beaumont’s did not surprise him and he did not allow himself to feel any pain because of it. Perhaps he would see them again, he thought, now he was going into society more. If it happened to be so, he would be pleased and if it did not then he would not regard it.

This self-command stayed with Javert until he paid a visit to the Hôpital de la Charité one afternoon to make a donation. He was grateful for their services and thought it only right he should contribute to their good work, especially now he was in such comfortable circumstances himself. His donation and thanks were gratefully received and he would have left immediately after, had he not happened to meet nurse Comtois in the hallway. She curtsied to him and as she did not seem in a hurry, Javert took the opportunity to thank her personally.

“Why thank you, Monsieur Javert,” she said, visibly pleased. “It is very gratifying to see you looking so well, but I had previously heard such good accounts of you it does not surprise me.”

“Indeed?” Javert answered in surprise.

“Forgive me, Monsieur,” Madame Comtois said. “But I made free to ask Mademoiselle Beaumont how you were getting on.”

“And it was she who gave these good accounts?” Javert asked, concealing a considerable amount of embarrassment.

“Indeed she did, Monsieur,” Madame Comtois answered.

“Her kindness to me was extraordinary,” Javert said. “Her goodness must alleviate the suffering of many a patient between these walls.”

“To be sure it does, Monsieur,” Madame Comtois agreed. “Mademoiselle still comes in regularly, though not so often as she sometimes did.”

“I am surprised to hear it,” Javert answered.

“Are you really, Monsieur?” Madame Comtois said pleasantly. “I suppose it would seem strange to you, since Mademoiselle was here almost once a week for most of your stay here, but that was really uncommonly often I assure you.”

She shook her head. “I did wonder that her father should allow it, Monsieur Beaumont is always most anxious for Mademoiselle’s health.”

Javert made an absentminded reply.

“One cannot wonder at his apprehensions, considering his poor wife,” Madame Comtois chatted on.

“It is not to be supposed that Mademoiselle Beaumont has her mother’s constitution,” Javert said earnestly.

“Oh no, Monsieur,” Madame Comtois agreed. “I have told her many times she has the health and strength to compete with of any of my nurses.”

“A compliment gladly received I am sure,” Javert replied. He felt uncomfortable talking about Mademoiselle Beaumont with the nurse. This style of conversation seemed to him very close to gossiping, which he did not think a man could allow to indulge in.

“Ah yes, but Mademoiselle Beaumont is always so affable,” Madame Comtois said. “Although I did not think her in spirits when I saw her last.”

Javert gave her an enquiring look, but Madame Comtois merely smiled and congratulated him again on his near complete recovery. Javert longed to know more, but did not feel justified to ask, so he thanked her and took his leave.

As he made his way home, his conversation with Madame Comtois weighed very heavily on his mind. He had been able to visit the hospital without the obtrusion of many memories, but she had made him think of Mademoiselle Beaumont sitting beside his bed and the image was hard to dispel. The nurse had said Mademoiselle Beaumont had not been in spirits. He remembered the rare moments that he had witnessed dejection or guilt in her and it pained him. It suddenly seemed to him a long time ago that he had last seen her. Suddenly he remembered her praising his honesty and he felt very conflicted. Perhaps, he thought, he might venture to write to her father. If he could find an occasion to do so.


	8. Part Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert admires and Marion sings.

“Marion,” Monsieur Beaumont said, entering the drawing room with a letter in his hand. “Here I have something that will please you.”

Marion looked up from her sewing and saw that her father’s face was lit up with gladness.

“Philippe shall come to visit!” he exclaimed.

In her haste to reach her father and snatch the letter from his hand Marion dropped her needlework. “Oh Papa!” she cried rapturously. “When?”

“He shall arrive in a fortnight,” Monsieur Beaumont said happily, handing her the letter.

“Does he say how long he means to stay?” Marion said eagerly, glancing over the letter with too much haste to read more than two words together.

“He never does,” her father answered. “But we shall contrive to keep him here as long as may be!”

Marion nodded and Monsieur Beaumont continued: “He shall arrive on Friday so the following Saturday we shall have a great party in his honour.”

“Oh yes, Papa,” Marion laughed.

She knew her father found only two kinds of gatherings acceptable. Very intimate ones, where he was thoroughly acquainted with everyone, or very large one’s where his occasional sudden absence would not be noticed. Philippe delighted in any kind of gathering and it would be a delight to him to meet all his Parisian friends and acquaintances at once, especially if that meant that he would not be able to have proper conversation with any of them.

Monsieur Beaumont looked at his daughter’s laughing face and said gently: “Shall we invite Monsieur Javert?”

There was no room for distress in Marion’s heart at present. She looked up at her father with glowing delight and said: “I would like that very much.”

…

When he received the invitation Javert was more than pleased, he was happy. It was signed by both Monsieur and Mademoiselle Beaumont, but it was evident the latter had written it.

He never had managed to find the courage to write to Monsieur Beaumont. It was very extraordinary that a man who had bravely wielded a sable without a single doubt or fear, would have such trouble in taking up a pen.

This invitation was at least a real proof of the Beaumont’s preference for his company and Javert was truly gratified. He could not look forward with complete enjoyment to a party as large as this one promised to be, for the invitation implied it to be a large one indeed. But Javert remembered the fondness with which Mademoiselle Beaumont had spoken of her brother and the thought of the delight she must be feeling pleased him.

“There shall not be much occasion to speak with her,” Javert told himself when he was dressing for the party. “But I shall have the pleasure of seeing her very happy, as she certainly deserves to be.”

This was a noble thought and it was certainly rewarded. When Javert arrived at the Beaumont residence, happiness was fairly bursting from all its windows. Upon being shown inside he was confronted with even more people than he had expected. Both the parlour and the drawing room were quite filled and all the guests moved about with the happy unconcern of people who knew they need not stand upon ceremony.

Monsieur and Mademoiselle Beaumont greeted him very warmly and introduced him to Philippe Beaumont, a very lively young man who was carried away by some friends as soon as the introduction was made. People were forever arriving and Javert contented himself with standing aside and observing Mademoiselle Beaumont while she welcomed her guests. She was more than happy, she seemed ecstatic. Whenever Philippe Beaumont passed her by he took care to either press her hand or kiss her cheek and her eyes shone with delight whenever he did. Luc Beaumont came to speak with him and assured him it was a pleasure to him to see him there. They were soon joined by Madame Travere who appeared to Javert to be much calmer and more attentive than he had previously found her to be.

“How good of you to come, Monsieur,” she said. “Mademoiselle Beaumont was afraid you would be kept away by the number of guests.”

“I am certainly not used to assemblies of such a size,” Javert answered. “But I assure you it gives me great pleasure to be here.”

“This great exuberance is all to give joy to my brother,” Luc Beaumont assured him. “He is the kind of man that delights in company.”

There was a loud burst of laughter from another room.

“He also delights in noise,” Luc said. “Excuse me.”

He hastily went towards the growing tumult of voices and Madame Travere laughed softly.

“I see your disapprobation, Monsieur,” she said.

“Merely surprise, Madame,” Javert corrected her civilly.

“I see my husband wants me,” Madame Travere said, looking over her shoulder. “But do not worry Monsieur, soon there will be no more arrivals to greet and Marion shall be free to come and find you I am sure.”

She smiled and left Javert in great confusion. The name Marion, spoken to him in such a familiar way, left him with very conflicting feelings. These feelings were not yet quieted when Marion fulfilled Madame Travere’s prediction.

“Such a crowd,” she smiled at Javert, taking a seat near him. “It is incredible to me how many people my brother knows.”

“I am sure your brother is most grateful for the trouble yourself and your father have gone through for his enjoyment,” Javert answered.

The heat had brought a blush to Mademoiselle Beaumont’s cheeks and he thought she was in very good looks.

“It is not so agreeable to me,” Marion confessed. “To have such a great deal of people in the house, but luckily the chief of my duties as hostess are now behind me.”

“You do credit to the honours of your father’s house,” Javert said with a smile.

“Thank you, Monsieur,” she said cheerfully.

There was a short silence as Javert thought of something appropriate to say. “You evidently take great enjoyment in your brother’s company,” he remarked.

“Oh yes,” Marion agreed. “It is a punishment to me he is so little in Paris.”

“But it must make his current presence all the more valuable,” Javert said.

“Indeed it does,” Marion said sincerely and then, looking up she added: “Here he comes now.”

Philippe Beaumont came towards them with determination and chose a seat on his sister’s other side. “Inspector!” he exclaimed to Javert. “I have not yet had the opportunity to talk with you properly.”

“This is _Monsieur_ Javert, Philippe,” Marion corrected him with a blush.

“Ah yes,” Philippe smiled with manners that were as easy as they were unaffected. “My sister has spoken of you in the highest terms, do forgive me for remembering her information incorrectly.”

Javert was very surprised, but he smiled and assured Philippe no offence was taken. He saw the young man glance at his cane and then quickly survey his person in an attempt to find the cause for it. “Is your sister-in-law present also?” Javert asked Marion, pretending not to notice Philippe’s curiosity.

“She is not,” Marion answered, her eyes upbraiding her brother. “My nephew has a bad cold and she did not like to leave him.”

“Dear Constantin,” Philippe exclaimed. “Is he much grown?”

“Has Luc not told you all about him and Camille yesterday?” Marion smiled.

“Of course,” Philippe said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “But I cannot depend upon his information, because every time I return to Paris he tells me that Constantin is grown no less than six inches and that Camille’s beauty has at least doubled.”

Marion laughed and it occurred to Javert that he had not yet heard her laugh so heartily.

“Constantin is a fine boy and tall for his age,” she said. “And Camille will be quite the little lady very soon.”

“I see your great affection extends itself to all members of your family,” Javert smiled.

“Monsieur!” Philippe exclaimed. “How could you suppose anything else to be the truth? My sister has given me to understand you have been acquainted for quite some months. And I would expect anyone who has known my sister for more than a week to be persuaded that she is the most affectionate creature on this earth!”

“Philippe,” Marion said reproachfully, but smiling.

“You shall not stop me,” Philippe laughed at her. “For I speak only the truth. Do you dare disagree with me, Monsieur?”

“Indeed I do not,” Javert said.

“I thank you, Monsieur,” Philippe smiled. “You have indulged a brother’s unreasonable feelings.”

“In your case they cannot be so unreasonable as they might have been in many others,” Javert answered.

Marion attempted to hide her face, but Philippe was delighted with this speech. “There, Monsieur,” he said. “I can see that we shall be fast friends.” Then, perceiving a young woman and two young men moving in their direction, he hastily said to Marion in a low voice: “I must be off immediately, there is Raoul Chaput to force his sister upon me.” He got to his feet and reached out a hand to Marion. “Will you not take a turn with me in the garden?”

Marion glanced at Javert, who rose immediately and said: “By all means, do not let me prevent you.”

Marion curtsied, but had hardly the time to express her wish of speaking to him again, before Philippe hurried her out of the room.

Javert observed the disappointment of Monsieur Chaput and the relief obviously felt by his sister and concluded that Philippe Beaumont was very unlike both his sister and his elder brother. The noise and heat of the room suddenly oppressed him and he was about to move towards an opened window, when he was addressed by Monsieur Beaumont.

“Will you not join me in my library, Monsieur,” he said most earnestly. “I fear I cannot bear this crowd much longer.”

This proposal could hardly be better calculated to relieve Javert’s feelings. He bowed and gratefully followed Monsieur Beaumont to the library, where it was at least tolerably quiet. They sat down and for a moment simply enjoyed the absence of conversation.

“It is the one redeeming quality of a party such as this,” Monsieur Beaumont remarked after a while. “That even the host might disappear for a while without any of the guests being aware of it.”

“Very true,” Javert said.

Monsieur Beaumont sighed. “I really cannot tell you,” he said. “How gratifying it is to me you are willing to favour me with your company, as there is hardly a guest in my house at present – save yourself – it would be possible for me to have a sensible conversation with.”

Javert was surprised, but pleased. He felt all the force of a compliment from a man like Monsieur Beaumont and had not at all expected such an estimation of his abilities. “I thank you, Monsieur,” he said with an inclination of the head. “It is not often I am favoured with superior society.”

“Superior society,” Monsieur Beaumont observed. “Is too often used to describe people of rank or fortune, while it should only apply to those in possession of an improved mind and agreeable manners.”

“I am sure you unite the qualities of both descriptions,” Javert answered, slightly taken aback by the implications of Monsieur Beaumont’s speech.

“People of rank I am sure would disagree with you,” the other smiled in return. “But I will gladly drop that first component and then we shall agree that at least to each other, we both are superior society.”

Javert was not a man that was ever overcome by shyness. If he felt something of this emotion now his face did not show it, perhaps because it was not in the habit of doing so. He answered Monsieur Beaumont in a way that clearly showed the respect and esteem he felt. Monsieur Beaumont answered in a similar tone, albeit in a more easy manner in the hope Javert would adopt the same comfortable style. If Javert did not quite manage to match Monsieur Beaumont’s amount of comfort, he did approach it and they were conversing with spirit when the door to the library opened and Luc Beaumont appeared.

Monsieur Beaumont laughed. “There you see the very bad influence I must have been on my children, Monsieur,” he said.

Javert smiled.

“It is traditional, is it not?” Luc Beaumont said, sitting down. “To abandon one’s guests when they are at the height of their enjoyment.”

“Your guests certainly do not seem to hold it against you,” Javert remarked, when the roaring of laughter reached them.

“No indeed,” Monsieur Beaumont said. “In any case, they will not all stay for long, I have high hopes that there shall be room to move about the drawing room later in the evening.”

The three men talked very pleasantly for a while, highly gratified that no one came to disturb them. They all expressed their disinclination to join the other guests, but eventually Luc Beaumont suggested they might play a round of cards.

“I certainly have no objection to it,” Monsieur Beaumont said.

“If we can find Philippe, we shall be four,” Luc Beaumont said cheerfully.

Playing at cards was not a pastime Javert had ever allowed himself to indulge in. Gambling of any sort he abhorred. But he felt the kindness of the invitation and would not want to appear ungrateful after being so singled out from the rest of the guests.

“Please excuse me from making a fourth at your table,” he said. “But I shall fetch Monsieur Philippe Beaumont to you directly, I believe he is walking in the garden.”

Monsieur Beaumont and Luc did not protest, so Javert left the library and walked to the glass doors opening into the garden. As he had expected, Philippe and Marion Beaumont were still together. He was about to call out to them, but something made him draw back. Suddenly he felt himself an intruder. Brother and sister were standing beside a small water basin, looking up at the night’s sky.

“Would you sing the star song for me, Marion?” Javert heard Philippe say.

Mademoiselle Beaumont did not answer, or at least Javert did not hear her do so. Neither did he hear her draw breath, but when she started to sing he heard every word. Marion sang, looking from her brother's smiling face to the starry sky and back again:

 

“ _Stars… In your multitudes_  
_Scarce to be counted_  
_Filling the darkness_  
_With splendour and light_  
_You are the sentinels_  
_Silent and kind_  
_Keeping watch in the night_  
_Keeping watch in the night._  
   
_You keep your place in the sky_  
_Give us a course and an aim_  
_As each in your season returns and returns_  
_Ever distant and high_  
_But should you fall to grant us a wish,_  
_You light the sky!_  
  
_And so it has been, and must be forever_  
_As our eyes turn towards the skies_  
_That those who wish on a falling star_  
_Receive, their prize._  
  
_Lord, give me starlight_  
_Let that sweet starlight_  
_Heal all my scars!_  
_Let me never want_  
_For love or for life  
__This I wish on the stars…!_ ”

 

Javert stood frozen in the dark. He could hardly breathe. The sweetness of the sentiments expressed seemed to him a perfect representation of Mademoiselle Beaumont’s mind. So hopeful and confident in the existence of beauty and goodness. He felt like a dishonest man, listening in on what should be a private meeting between brother and sister, but he could not bear to move away. The song ended and a tranquil silence fell over the dark garden.

“I have missed your songs, Marion,” Philippe finally spoke.

“And I have missed you,” Marion replied, as she could not express this sentiment often enough.

Philippe took her hand and pressed it. “Dear sister,” he said.

By this time Javert had recovered enough to speak. So he went into the garden and called out Philippe’s name. Both Philippe and Marion turned around in surprise, but not at all displeased with his interruption.

“Your father and brother ask if you care to play at cards, Monsieur,” he said with a bow.

“Indeed I do,” Philippe said cheerfully. “Will you make our fourth?”

“I think not, Monsieur,” Javert replied stiffly.

“Even better,” Philippe smiled. “Then you can take my place at my sister’s side and watch over her as she stargazes. My family has always contrived to never leave my sister alone in the starlight, as we rather suspect she would fly away from us forever.”

With a flashing grin he strode towards the open garden doors, leaving Javert standing beside a embarrassedly smiling Marion.

“My brother delights in a joke,” she made excuse.

“You need not fear my disapprobation,” Javert said in a low voice.

Marion was struck by his gentle tone and looked at him.

“There is not a member of your family I do not esteem,” he said earnestly.

“I thank you, Monsieur,” she said. “There are few things that could have pleased me more.”

They stood together in silence, stargazing dutifully.

“Shall we not sit?” Marion proposed after a while, hoping Javert would not be offended.

“Not if Mademoiselle would prefer to walk,” Javert said. He was not offended, but his legs gave him relatively little trouble lately and he wanted her to know that.

“I would,” Marion replied.

Javert silently offered her his arm and she took it. She took care not to lean on him and luckily he was not so much taller than her to make this very difficult. But her hand lay on his arm as if these thoughts had not even crossed her mind and Javert did not suspect her. They took a turn around the garden, neither of them able to find a suitable topic to begin speaking on. Marion was too aware of her heart beating fast and Javert was growing more uncertain with every step.

Philippe Beaumont seemed a very young man to him. Seeing Marion with him made him think her even younger than he knew she must be. And yet he felt almost certain that, apart from her brothers and father, there was no man she bestowed so much attention on as him. Here she was, walking on his arm. Would she not have proposed to follow her brother inside at once if she had not felt something like true regard for him?

“I have been meaning to ask you,” Marion broke in on his thoughts. “If you would tell me about your work at the Conciergerie.”

“Have I not described my current position adequately before?” he enquired.

Marion smiled. “It is hard for me to imagine what manner of things need doing in the overseeing of such a place,” she said. “You must recollect, Monsieur, how very ill-informed I must be concerning such matters.”

Javert looked at her with great surprise, mostly because of her describing herself as ill-informed, but also because she wished to know the particulars of his profession.

“I could relate to you some of the changes I have made or am endeavouring to make,” he suggested.

“Please do,” Marion urged.

So Javert spoke of the little instances of corruption or dishonesty he had observed when still an inspector that he now intended to put an end to. Marion observed to him that he was putting his old principles of rectitude, order and honesty to good use. This drew a smile from him. It flattered him that her memory of their earlier conversations was so exact. He also explained that protocol had forced newly arrived prisoners to wait barefoot on the cold flagstone floor for so long a time they often caught cold, which led to unnecessary hospital expenses. His aim was to develop a protocol that did not have such a drawback.

Marion looked up at him with an expressive smile. “And are you content with your progress thus far?” she asked.

“I am indeed,” he said.

After a moment’s hesitation he ventured to say: “It would please me to hear your reflections upon my work.”

“I think,” Marion said carefully. “That however great your merit may have been as an inspector, your contribution to the good of society in your current profession will be greater still.”

Javert did not answer.

“That is to say that I admire your work exceedingly and from what you have told me I do not think there was ever any need for you to distrust your moral principles.”

Javert was taken aback for a moment. Upon consideration he could indeed not say he had dropped any of the principles that had led him in his former life, but he certainly felt their implications had changed.

“You do not?” he finally said.

“No,” Marion smiled. “I think you merely adopted some other principles to supplement those already present.”

“You may be very right,” Javert answered after a moment of reflection. “But I cannot say I could name the newly admitted principles you speak of.”

“I could try to identify them for you,” Marion said quietly.

“By all means,” he invited her.

“I think compassion and kindness would be good fellows for your original three,” she said. “As they will help to make what is proper into what is truly just and will ward off any cruelty that may inadvertently accompany either order, honesty or rectitude.”

Javert thought about this. Marion did not break the silence, as she could perceive it was by no means silent inside his mind. She was quietly flattered he gave her opinion so much consideration. It pleased her that the surroundings of the hospital were not a prerequisite for their open discussion of each other’s principles.

“And what name would you give,” he said after a while. “To my having to change from believing there was only one right path, only one straight line, to believing – as I am now forced to do, however reluctantly – that there is more than one way to be right.”

“That, I think, I would call mildness,” Marion answered. “Or openness if you will.”

“These are not words I have ever associated with my character,” Javert confessed gravely.

“Well, in many cases, I think a little goes a long way,” Marion said.

Hearing a change in the tone of her voice, Javert looked at her. She was smiling.

“What amuses you?” he said, smiling in return.

“I do not smile out of amusement,” Marion said, looking away to hide some of her true feelings. “I sometimes smile merely because I am happy.”

Javert did not reply, as he expected a reply was not needed. He was quite right and they walked back towards the house in silence, each feeling a considerable, though not quite equal amount of happiness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided to break historical correctness to give a nod to the wonderful musical that got me into this story in the first place. ‘Stars’ is my favourite song and I hope you enjoyed Marion’s rendition of it.


	9. Part Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert makes a confession and Philippe Beaumont is an excellent brother.

The following morning Javert could give no other relief to his feelings other than by pacing back and forth through his rooms. He no longer knew how to deny what Marion Beaumont meant to him. He loved her. It was terrible to him to confess such feelings, even to himself, but it was the truth. He could no longer call it regard, friendship or even admiration. He loved her, more than he had ever loved any other creature on earth.

After this terrible realization his own mind, that he no longer felt master of, began to make suggestions equally terrible. The thought of confessing his love, of asking this woman to marry him… He did not know whether to condemn it or admit it as the only possibility for his future happiness. One moment it seemed to him a most impertinent and presumptuous thing to do. The next he thought that hiding such thoughts was deceitful to others and destructive to himself. After all…it did seem that she cared for him. Truly cared for him. But had this not seemed like this from the first? Was this not merely her kindness of manner and goodness of heart? Still, a lady like her would not behave with such openness, show such obvious enjoyment in his society, if she did not value him. And yet, her behaviour might only be so unguarded because the thought of a man like him even daring to think of courting her had not occurred to her at all.

Such were the agonizing thoughts of Javert. At the mercy of his feelings he was by turns overwhelmingly wretched and irrepressibly happy and he had not the power to change it.

…

Marion meanwhile, was wholly unaware of the misery she was causing. Her whole morning was devoted to Philippe, who to her delight had resolved to stay at home for the day.

As it happened Philippe had been severely chided by his father when he had heard he had asked Monsieur Javert to keep Marion company in the garden. This had surprised him greatly, since Philippe had never known his father to admit anyone into his private company he did not trust implicitly or considered a friend. Monsieur Beaumont had been very unwilling to explain his feelings on the subject and had told Philippe that:

“Unpleasant scenes may arise without the presence of either malice or impropriety.”

If Monsieur Beaumont had expected his son to be ashamed and therefore silent, he was sorely mistaken. It did not take Philippe long to recollect that Marion had looked rather pink when she had returned from the garden and it occurred to him that his coming home might not have been the only reason she had been in such high spirits at the party. Come to think of it, it was rather unusual for her to enjoy a gathering of such a size. These thoughts had been on his mind all morning and after much talk on many subjects, Philippe suddenly burst forth:

“Sister, you must tell me now of your own accord or I shall be forced to plague you with questions until you do.”

“Whatever are you talking of?” Marion exclaimed, quite taken by surprise.

“You must tell me about this man Javert,” he said seriously.

“I have told you a great deal already,” Marion said. “And I am sure father and Luc have told you everything else there is to tell.”

“Come now, do not try to deceive me,” Philippe said laughingly. “You care for this man, do you not?”

Marion looked at her brother, whom she had missed so much. She did not say a word, but he nodded in understanding.

“I see,” he said. “And what does father say?”

“We have not talked upon this subject,” Marion said, looking away. “As it can do no good.”

“What makes you say that?” Philippe asked.

“I do not think Monsieur Javert thinks of me as I do of him,” she answered, shaking her head. “He is a serious man, and I cannot perceive more than common esteem in him.”

“I must disagree with you there,” her brother said with conviction. “I do not know him as long as you, so I could not tell you what he truly thinks of you, but I can tell you that he treats you very differently from any other person I have seen him converse with.”

“Indeed?” Marion said, colouring a little. She had herself sometimes thought that this was perhaps the case, but she was not a woman to expect admiration and certainly not one to easily believe herself admired.

“Absolutely,” Philippe said seriously. “You call him a serious man and I do not doubt it, but I assure you that his gravity and silence increase tenfold when you are not present.”

He had the pleasure of seeing Marion smile and tenderly he continued: “There is more than common esteem in this, there may be no other reason for his reserve than his uncertainty of your own feelings.”

“Can he be uncertain of them?” Marion said. “I hardly know how to be more encouraging.”

Philippe laughed. “Oh, ladies always suppose men to be so easily persuaded of a woman’s feeling affection for them,” he said. “You do not realize what we suffer, when we tell ourselves it is merely our arrogance that sees a peculiar regard in her expressions.”

“Have you suffered then?” Marion asked smilingly.

“I speak of the generality of men,” Philippe said with a wave of his hand. “But I would not be surprised if your Monsieur Javert is suffering.”

Marion shook her head again, but then she said: “If this be the case, what can be done to make him understand me?”

Philippe laughed. “You need do nothing more, dear sister,” he said. “Give him time and he shall find it out.”

“When shall he find it out?” Marion sighed. “There cannot be many opportunities for us to meet, at least not very often.”

“There you are mistaken,” Philippe said with a brilliant smile. “For now that I know what is in your best interest I shall make Papa and Luc invite him whenever there is even the slightest eligible motive. And as soon as I have taken a house I shall invite him too. Between the three of us we must be able to secure you enough time with him to make him see what is before him.”

Marion laughed at such a speech, but she was pleased.

“Depend upon it,” Philippe assured her. “I shall do everything in my power to assist your cause.”

“ _My cause_ ,” Marion repeated, smiling reproachfully.

Philippe took her hand and looked at her earnestly. “I have never minded you not wanting to marry, sweet Marion,” he said in a low voice. “But now I see you in love, I shall not be easy until I see you loved in return.”

“Dear Philippe,” Marion said, unable to say any more.

“Oh little sister,” Philippe laughed, shaking off his solemnity. “I shall see you married yet!”

Marion laughed with him, her spirits rising under his cheerful conviction. “But Philippe,” she said suddenly. “Did you say you shall take a house in town? Will you be staying in Paris?”

“I certainly shall for now!” Philippe exclaimed. “For I now have business here that shall not be delayed!”

…

Philippe was as good as his word. With a speed that proved he had already been looking into possible lodgings to rent he took a house and nothing was more proper than an evening party to show it off. Javert was invited and he went, not knowing what to expect, but demanding of himself that he be composed.

Composure proved difficult to maintain, however, for not only was Marion Beaumont more lively and attentive than she had ever been, Philippe Beaumont seemed intent on getting acquainted with him. He could not imagine what reason he could have for this, apart from his sister’s recommendation. Philippe Beaumont’s high spirits were not quite to Javert’s taste, but they were too much like Mademoiselle Beaumont’s to be truly offensive to him.

“I am afraid you do not like my friends,” Philippe made excuse after laughing heartily at one of his friend’s jokes. “They are vulgar fellows, but I assure you there is no harm in them.”

Javert gave him an enquiring look. “I have met with many worse,” he said gravely. “But if this I your opinion of them I wonder you feel comfortable admitting them into the presence of ladies.” For besides Marion, there were quite a number of young women present.

Philippe nodded, seemingly serious. “Very true,” he said. “I shall speak to them directly.” He rose very suddenly and called out to Marion, who was moving in their general direction. “Marion! Do take my place by Monsieur Javert,” he said loudly. “That way he will not be offended if I leave him to admonish my barbarous friends.”

Before Javert had time to reply, Philippe had placed Marion on the seat he had occupied and had left them by themselves.

Marion dared to laugh at his expression. “I have warned you before,” she said. “That my brother cannot always be taken seriously, he is a youngest son you know and must be excused.”

“You do not employ your youth in the same manner,” Javert said seriously.

“Not at present,” Marion smiled.

“Is your character lately changed then?” he asked uncertainly.

“Not very lately,” she answered. “But my friend Madame Travere tells me I have indeed changed, she often tells me I have grown too serious.”

Javert was surprised. “Madame Travere is a very good woman I am sure,” he said. “But I cannot imagine why she would reproach you for being serious. Especially as I can only suppose her to mean your dedication to the improvement of your mind and the welfare of the weaker members of society.”

He thought Marion coloured a little at this compliment, but he pretended not to see and concluded his speech: “These should be qualities to inspire nothing but admiration.”

 

Judging from his sister’s smile Philippe trusted the conversation was to her liking. He was very pleased with himself and took care none of his friends would disturb her or Monsieur Javert. He was now completely convinced that the gentleman was in love with his sister. He had closely attended to Javert’s conversations with the other women of the party, and the indifference in his expressions could not have escaped Philippe. He showed nothing more than civility to any of them, and some of the ladies were a great deal prettier than Marion. Even Philippe’s brotherly partiality could not deny that. Monsieur Javert did not seem to think so, however, and further proof seemed unnecessary. Thus convinced Philippe was prepared to carry out every scheme he considered to be in his power. There was not a great deal of effort required. His father and brother did not need to receive many hints to silently promise their co-operation.

Luc contented himself with mentioning to Javert that he was a great addition to their party and that whenever he would give a dinner again, he was sure to receive an invitation. Monsieur Beaumont, however, felt sure enough of Javert’s esteem for him to address him in the following manner when Philippe’s evening party came to an end:

“It would be highly gratifying to me, Monsieur, if you would come and spend a day with us at your earliest convenience. I quite understand if that cannot be soon, for I fear my family has been rather a tax on your time.”

“Yourself and your family have all been extremely kind, Monsieur,” Javert said sincerely.

“Please think of it as kindness most willingly bestowed and with the best of intentions,” Monsieur Beaumont said.

This was a speech so deliberate Javert could not ignore it. Even the most self-depreciating reflections could not wave it away as insignificant. Could it be possible that Monsieur Beaumont meant to encourage him? If this was the case, Philippe’s exuberant behaviour was perhaps meant in the same way. This idea stayed with him all the way home. Aided by the remembrance of Luc Beaumont’s hint and the blush on Marion’s cheeks it lifted his spirits so high that the sight of his sober lodgings did not distress him. He sat down and thought earnestly about his position at the Conciergerie, his salary and his savings. He had always been frugal for no other reason than his considering prudence a virtue. Perhaps that virtue would now be able to offer a reward beyond itself.

…

The next morning at breakfast, Javert surprised his housekeeper with an unexpected question.

“Madame Bisset,” he said rather suddenly. “If I were to take a larger house, one perhaps more suited to my new position, what would be your considerations?”

“Forgive me, Monsieur Javert,” Madame Bisset said, slightly distressed. “I do not comprehend you.”

“Would you feel up to managing such a house?” Javert elaborated. “It occurs to me you might require some help.”

Madame Bisset was a woman who prided herself on being as respectable as respectable could be. She had been widowed young, but had never let grief make her inactive. Her manners were proper, her household skills varied and excellent. Monsieur Javert had hired her when he acquired the rank of inspector and he had always been a strict, but good employer. His wishes were particular, but never extravagant and he had always treated her with respect. Talkative or especially attentive he had never been, however, and the earnest way he was looking at her at present discomposed her.

It must have something to do with his new acquaintances, Madame Bisset thought to herself. After his accident she had noticed her master’s spirits were in a state of great turmoil. She had hoped that his going out more would have done him good and although she did think that lately his spirits were improving, she could not call them tranquil.

Madame Bisset realized that Javert was waiting patiently for an answer and she attempted a polite smile.

“How very kind of you to think of me in your decision, Monsieur,” she said. “I would be honoured to keep your house in whatever manner you see fit.”

Javert nodded. He had long relied on Madame Bisset’s good sense. Her reserved manner was pleasing to him, but on the present occasion he felt compelled to share some of his thoughts. “I have by no means made up my mind,” he said. “But a larger house…better situated… This might be considered as a very eligible moment to make the change.”

“Certainly, Monsieur,” Madame Bisset answered, wondering what could have brought this on.

“You must have a maid or two to assist you,” Javert said, with some absence of mind. “And perhaps some of your duties might be made over to a cook.”

Madame Bisset was speechless.

“I am keeping you from your work,” Javert recollected himself. “Thank you Madame Bisset, you may go if you like.”

“Thank you, Monsieur,” Madame Bisset said with a curtsy and she hurried out of the room, her head full of the image of managing a proper household of servants.

 

…

 

In accordance to Monsieur Beaumont’s wishes Javert called on him and sat once again with him in his library.

“I trust I need not invite you to dinner?” Monsieur Beaumont said smilingly. “For I quite depend upon your company for the rest of the day.”

Javert bowed his agreement and they talked until they were joined by Marion and Philippe.

“How good of you to come so soon!” Marion said, warmly shaking Javert’s hand.

“Indeed,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled. “And you need not fret Marion, I have already extracted a promise from Monsieur Javert to stay the rest of the day.”

Marion took care to show Javert her gratified smile and they all sat down and talked pleasantly. When a short silence occurred, produced by a want of fresh subjects for conversation, Philippe turned to Marion and said:

“Dear sister, can I entreat you to read to us? I have not had an opportunity to enjoy your reading since I returned.”

Marion glanced at Javert, fearing that her reading would bring him back to his time in the hospital in an unpleasant way.

Javert, however, thought only of the pleasure of hearing Marion read and answered Philippe with a smile: “I do not wonder at your considering it a deprivation.”

“Of the keenest kind,” Philippe nodded with affected gravity.

“Choose a book then, Marion,” Monsieur Beaumont laughed. “Unless you wish your brother to accuse you of cruelty.”

Marion happily rose to make her choice and returned immediately with an old favourite. The men were silent and listened as Marion read aloud the necessary introductions, foreshadowing and descriptions that attend every first chapter of a novel. Philippe looked smilingly at the ceiling, reclining on the sofa, and Monsieur Beaumont often closed his eyes, but Javert looked only at Marion. She sat very straight, exactly as she had done at the hospital, but this time she read without having to lower her voice. Her enthusiasm in the story was unchecked and Javert felt he had never been able to do her reading justice before. The clock on the mantelpiece sounded and Philippe sat upright.

“You have held us spellbound, sister,” he said.

Marion looked up from her book and repressed a laugh. Javert and Philippe followed her gaze and saw that Monsieur Beaumont had fallen asleep in his chair.

“The highest form of appreciation,” Philippe said, in a loud whisper. “I shall go speak to the cook about the dinner, pray do not read on without me.”

He quietly left the room and left Marion to smilingly make excuses for her father. Javert assured her none were needed and thanked her for reading as long as she did.

“It is my pleasure, really,” Marion said. “I cannot think of anyone who would not love to read to such a faithful audience.”

Javert smiled. He thought that the noise and animation of a dinner party could never be more agreeable than such a comfortable gathering as this. As he watched Marion idly turning the pages of her novel, a grave look clouded his face. He was tolerably convinced that both Marion and her family truly liked him, but he still could not believe that Marion would marry him. Perhaps she did have a regard for him that exceeded friendship, but it could not be founded upon a true understanding of his real character.

“Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he said suddenly. “I wonder-”

He stopped, which prompted Marion to say entreatingly: “I hope you will always speak your mind to me, Monsieur, no matter the occasion.”

Javert gave her a grim smile and nodded. “Perhaps you recall I once spoke to you of my actions in my former life and of the harm I felt I had caused,” he said gravely.

“Indeed I do,” Marion said softly.

“I have never spoken of this to you again,” Javert sighed. “As it cannot be agreeable to me to relate what must sink me in your opinion.”

Marion gave him a look that plainly spoke her finding such a thing highly improbably, but he did not see it.

“Yet I feel I am obligated to confess at least in part the error of my former ways,” he went on.

“Is there not sufficient reason to be easy in the word _former_?” Marion asked gently.

“No there is not,” Javert told her, looking at her seriously.

“Then by all means,” Marion said, adopting a similar tone. “Tell me what weighs on your mind.”

Javert could hardly keep his resolve while her eyes were so fixed on him, but having begun he felt it was impossible to draw back now. “Not very long ago you spoke of the good mercifulness and kindness would do for a man of my occupation,” he said.

Marion nodded.

“I must confess,” he said looking away. “I cannot say I have previously lived by these principles. In my pursuit of justice and the enforcement of the law I feel I have been often cruel to those who did not deserve it.”

Had he looked at Marion he would have suffered less, but not seeing her kind expression he suffered a great deal while he talked on.

“Quite devoid of what you would have called kindness, I always considered those doing wrong to be doing it out of their own wickedness. I had no consideration for the distress of their circumstances. Worse perhaps, in my colleagues I condemned what must have been acts of kindness and mercy as idleness and insubordination.” He fell silent, his head bowed in something so like shame that it pained Marion to see it.

“If you are correct in your description of yourself,” she said softly. “You have very likely hurt those that did not quite deserve it.”

Javert’s head bowed lower.

“You have not done this out of cruelty, however,” Marion spoke warmly. “Nor out of revenge or any such abhorrent feeling. You believed you were acting justly because you believed all people to be as strong as you. You, who even in the most distressed circumstances refused to stray from the path you saw was right. Viewed in such a light, the actions of these breakers of the law must indeed have seemed unpardonable.”

“I cannot allow you to construe my misdeeds as a proof of good character, Mademoiselle,” Javert said.

“Forgive me, Monsieur,” Marion answered. “While I will always attempt to attend to your wishes, you shall not forbid me my own opinions.”

Javert looked at her determined face, smiled and then shook his head. “These general actions are not my greatest error in the ways of justice,” he said. ‘Though they have led me to persecute a man who broke his parole, despite proof of his being a good man.”

“What do you mean, Monsieur?” Marion asked.

“Do not make me say his name,” Javert said wretchedly. “Be contented to know that I hated what I thought he was; a thief, a violent criminal, and that I swore to bring him to justice. Yet, when I had the opportunity, I could not bring myself to do it.”

Marion stayed silent.

“I believe he possessed these qualities of kindness and mercifulness as much as I lacked them,” Javert confessed.

There was a long silence. Eventually Marion broke it. “You said this was not the worst of your actions,” she said in a low voice.

“It was not,” Javert said gravely. He looked at her with concern. “I fear I will be forced to relate things to you that will distress you,” he said. “Your father I know will not thank me for it and I beg of you to stop me if the information I relate to you brings you pain.”

Marion nodded silently.

“I know you are not fond of politics, Mademoiselle,” Javert said. “And I have heard you speak with abhorrence of the rebellion that disturbed our city. I think, however, that your abhorrence is motivated by kindness, as it wounds you to think of people dying over a matter which you feel ought to be resolved with deliberation.”

He sighed heavily, but Marion did not interrupt him.

“My own feelings towards rebellion were those of hatred,” he continued. “A reverence for authority and a hatred towards all who rebelled against it was what caused me to volunteer to become a spy and infiltrate the resistance.”

This did indeed distress Marion, but moral considerations were far from her mind. All she could consider was how dangerous such an employment would be.

“It was in this manner I directly attributed to the deaths of the young men fighting for what they believed in,” Javert said darkly. “I have not yet learned to agree with them, but they had bravery and their convictions I believe were pure. What I believe now I did not see then, I did not reconsider my actions until they were dead before me, their blood colouring the streets.”

Marion had gone quite pale, but Javert could not speak while he looked at her, so he did not see.

“So young, one of them nothing but a boy, and I would have killed them all personally had I been given the opportunity.”

Upon hearing this Marion made a sound that made Javert look up and he saw her distress.

“I beg your pardon, Mademoiselle,” he said in a low voice.

“What do you mean by opportunity?” Marion interrupted his apology.

“My true identity was discovered by the very boy I spoke of,” Javert answered. “They restrained me and decided I should die, but the man they gave the right to shoot me set me free instead. That was the man I had hunted, the man I had perceived to be a villain. And yet he showed me mercy beyond what I would have ever shown him.”

Marion could not speak. Violent images were all jumbled together in her mind and between the lifeless body of a young boy and Monsieur Javert looking down the barrel of a pistol she did not know which shocked her more.

“I could not bear to think of a man I had attributed such evil to as a man whose path was no less straight than mine,” Javert said in a broken voice. “And these were the thoughts that drove me to the Seine, to-”

Not being able to bear it any longer Marion suddenly grasped Javert’s hand. “Go no further, Monsieur,” she begged him. “Never before did I know how much more I ought to have thanked God I had the opportunity of meeting you at all!”

The touch of her hand had petrified Javert, but now he was looking into her face. She was so full of emotion it cost Marion great effort to keep her voice low.

“If you consider your sins so very great, please rejoice you are alive to make amends!” She pressed his hand most sincerely. “You are not so very much to blame, Monsieur. Another’s path may be equally good, without yours being wrong. And your actions may be less than completely just, without all other’s being completely beyond reproach.” Marion caught Javert’s gaze and looked earnestly into his eyes. “None of this has made me think any less of you,” she said earnestly. “And I _beg_ of you, to make amends for your trespasses by doing good, instead of by punishing yourself now.” With those words she let go of his hand and withdrew her own with some embarrassment.

As Javert was quite unable to utter a word. A lengthy silence followed, which was only disturbed by the heavy breathing of Monsieur Beaumont. “Your brother,” Javert finally said. “Is very long in speaking to the cook.”

“Ah,” Marion said, clutching the handkerchief she had discreetly brought up to her face several times. “My brother is in the habit of getting distracted by the most ordinary things on the way to and from any errand.”

There was another silence, though a more comfortable one.

“If you would tell me how,” Javert spoke after a while. “I would make amends for the distress I caused you.”

Marion smiled at him and said: “There is no need as I am glad to have heard everything you told me.”

He persisted however.

“If I must name something that would oblige me,” she smiled. “You might take up my novel and read to me the last couple pages I read to you all. I have quite forgotten where we left the story and it would please me to hear you read for a change.”

“If you wish it,” Javert said uncomfortably. “But my reading is in no way worthy to be compared to yours.”

Marion silently handed him the book, smiling gently. Javert took it from her, silently prepared himself and began reading aloud. He did not read very well and the intonation of his voice could not differentiate between characters, but his voice was steady and he read calmly. Marion listened to him with pleasure and would have done so even if his reading had been a good deal worse. After a page and a half Philippe reappeared and gave an exclamation of mock dismay.

“This is using me very ill,” he complained. “Here I find you have carried on without me.”

His loud exclamation woke his father, who required an explanation of the situation.

“Philippe had just left us to speak to the cook,” Marion said. “And now accuses Monsieur Javert and I of continuing our reading without him, but we have done no such thing because Monsieur Javert was only reading to me the last pages I had read to you all to refresh my memory.”

“Then all is forgiven, dear sister,” Philippe said cordially, sitting down. “And I must beg forgiveness too, for I was gone far too long.”

Javert gladly returned the book to Marion, who read a little while longer. Philippe studied Javert’s countenance with enthusiasm, but he could not discover any decided change.

Later at dinner Monsieur Beaumont thought Marion was more quiet than usual, but she was certainly no less attentive to Javert. Javert noticed this likewise and although he had believed Marion when she had assured him he had not sunk in her opinion, he had already decided that she must be allowed time to reflect upon what he had said, before he could at all depend upon her continued regard. Still, when he returned home that evening it was in considerably better spirits than he had left it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No it wasn't THE confession yet, but we have certainly passed a turning point. Hope you are enjoying where this is going...


	10. Part Ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert sings and Marion and her father have a serious talk.

Javert was ashamed to find himself waiting for another invitation. Had it been possible he would have returned the kindness of the Beaumont family by inviting them all to his home, but he could not bear the thought of doing this. His search for a new abode now became more than theoretical and Madame Bisset began to suspect there was more afoot than a simple dissatisfaction with his present lodgings.

His anxiety was unnecessary. None of the Beaumonts thought him to be in a position to host a party himself and had every intention of inviting Javert back as soon as it could be done. Luc Beaumont had graciously taken it upon himself to plan a party he would never have given had it not been for the hints of Philippe.

“A small evening party,” he told Marion. “Will be most agreeable I think. There is no occasion to invite half of Paris.”

“Indeed there is not,” Marion smiled. “As we shall frequently see half of Paris at Philippe’s house.”

Despite this Luc did not think it right to let Monsieur Javert be the only stranger to a family party and therefore he invited one of his business associates as well. Luc did not quite agree with Philippe’s way of talking, but he took care to mention to Marion that Monsieur Javert had accepted his invitation and Marion was very glad of it. She was hopeful that now he had made the confessions of guilt he deemed necessary, he would be able to be convinced of her continued regard for him. Sometimes she did have doubts and thought that Javert’s silence on the subject of love was not because of his ignorance of _her_ regard, but because of the absence of his own. These thoughts rarely lasted long, however, because she was tolerably convinced that only very strong feelings on his part could have prompted him to talk to her on a subject so very painful to him. Even so, when she told her father that Luc had invited Monsieur Javert to his evening party, she was still a little distressed when her father answered:

“Is that to give pleasure to himself or to you, my dear?”

“I hope it would be to please everyone, Papa,” Marion answered, sitting down demurely.

Monsieur Beaumont looked at her earnestly. “I must say I was a little surprised,” he said kindly. “To receive a confession of your regard for Monsieur Javert from Philippe instead of from yourself.”

Marion did not answer, but she forced herself to look her father in the eye. He was smiling.

“Oh, Papa,” she said, sincerely sorry for never having talked to him.

“Were you not assured of my approbation?” he asked. “Could you believe I would ever oppose to something that would secure your happiness?”

“Oh no,” Marion said hastily. “But at first I did not know my own mind and later…I doubted Monsieur Javert’s intentions.”

Her father laughed softly. “His intentions are perhaps open to discussion,” he said. “But his feelings certainly cannot be.”

Marion coloured.

“Are you not persuaded of his regard for you?” Monsieur Beaumont asked.

“I think I am…” Marion said. “When last he visited he did speak to me about his past actions in a way that showed a desire to make me comprehend his entire character.”

“And do you comprehend it?” Monsieur Beaumont enquired earnestly.

“Enough to value it very highly,” Marion said shyly.

Her father smiled at her, but then his expression sobered and he leaned forward with a serious look. “Marion,” he said. “It is not necessary to tell that if you were to marry this man, it would be talked of.”

“In Paris every marriage is a piece of news,” Marion replied.

“Indeed,” her father said seriously. “But the report of Marion Beaumont marrying a police inspector will be spread with a considerably different tone than the report of her marrying a man of any other description.”

“Monsieur Javert is no longer an inspector, Papa,” Marion said gently.

“No,” he replied. “But I suppose you would have married him even if he was.”

“Yes,” Marion answered quietly.

“Very good,” her father nodded. “If only you are sure of yourself.”

“I am,” Marion said sincerely. “If he should propose, I would wish to accept him.”

Monsieur Beaumont nodded. “Well, you are right,” he said. “He is no longer an inspector and I think highly both his character and his abilities.”

Marion smiled at him, but she could not think of a response that would adequately express her feelings.

“I have only ever wanted to see you happy, my dear,” her father continued. “And if Monsieur Javert is the man to make you so, I can only hope he is quick about it.”

Marion laughed and her father took her hand affectionately.

“Please, let me never again see the frown on your face you have sometimes worn lately,” he said. “Be assured that your brothers and myself approve your choice and that when the time comes I will settle on you as much of my fortune as needed to secure your comfort.”

“Papa…” Marion said, overcome with her feelings and she kissed his cheek.

“There, there,” Monsieur Beaumont said with a smile. “I trust you will be easy now.”

Suddenly he laughed and Marion thought she had never heard him sound as much like Philippe when he said:

“How preposterous of me, to expect a young lady in love to be easy! I am really a very naïve father.”

“You are no such thing,” Marion smiled, amused by the idea that at least in the ways of love she was indeed still young. “And I will be easy, Papa,” she added. “You have made me easy.”

“Then I shall leave it to Philippe to make you uneasy again,” her father smiled. “I am sure he shall be visiting to tease you as soon as he hears of Luc’s invitation.”

“Luckily he shall have very little time for that,” Marion said happily. “For the party is very soon.”

…

When Javert arrived at Luc Beaumont’s house the following Friday, he was very pleased to find the gathered party so small. Apart from the Beaumonts there was only one other, a man that might still be called young by the name of Adrien Fabron. There were two members of the family, however, that Javert had not met before, the children Constantin and Camille. Louisa Beaumont was very fond of her children and her husband was no different, so the children received a very affectionate upbringing. Upon his entrance Camille curtsied and Constantin bowed and they both said solemnly:

“Good evening, Monsieur Javert.”

“Good evening,” he said with a smile, and to Louise Beaumont: “What fine children you have, Madame Beaumont.”

It was evident that Marion was a most affectionate aunt and the children clearly delighted in her company. As Marion invited Javert to sit by her, the children had plenty of opportunity to study him. Camille contented herself with staring at him until Marion kindly admonished her, but young Constantin was bolder.

“Do you not carry a sword?” he asked curiously.

“Do you not carry a sword, _Monsieur_ ,” Marion corrected him. “But in truth you should not be asking such impertinent questions at all.”

“Curiosity cannot be reprehensible,” Javert said kindly. “When it is properly governed.” He smiled at Constantin and said: “I have carried a sabre for many years, young man, but I have no use for it in my current profession.”

The boy looked somewhat disappointed. “Did you often fight with it, Monsieur?” he asked eagerly.

“Whenever it was needed,” Javert said seriously. “But the use of excessive force cannot be excused in any member of the police force.”

Constantin frowned and Marion listened with an irrepressible smile as Javert explained to her young nephew the principle of duty. When the boy begged for a story of bravery and wicked deeds averted Javert glanced uncertainly at Marion. She, however, joined her nephew in his entreaties.

“Oh yes, Monsieur,” she laughed. “Do tell!”

Thus encouraged Javert told Constantin and Camille of his efforts to apprehend a gang of swindlers and thieves. He would not change the truth for the benefit of his young listeners, but contented himself with deliberately omitting the details that might make it inappropriate. The children were delighted and Marion was hardly less so. It was a very good beginning to the evening. Very soon hereafter, however, something occurred to distress Marion and to disconcert Javert.

Luc, in his considerate schemes, had not realized that Adrien Fabron was perhaps not the best choice of guest considering the hidden motive behind this party. Monsieur Fabron was very comfortably single and had absolutely no intention of changing his situation. But he was fond of superior society and Marion Beaumont was a great favourite of his. Having long ascertained there was no danger of him inspiring any feelings in her beyond friendship he was in the habit of paying Marion very decided attentions whenever they were together.

Normally his easy manners pleased Marion, but feeling herself to be closely observed by Monsieur Javert she was suddenly very apprehensive of giving the wrong impression. Monsieur Fabron distressed her greatly with his attempts to single her out and she did everything that civility would allow to avoid his conversation.This produced no other effect than Monsieur Fabron taking Javert’s seat by Marion as soon as he left it and telling her with great concern that he thought her strangely out of spirits this evening.

Javert observed it all with growing uncertainty. He had never heard Marion speak of Adrien Fabron, but it was evident he was an old friend of her brother’s and very fond of her. He did not know what to think and the more he listened to Monsieur Fabron’s conversation with Marion, the graver he became. Luckily this did not go unnoticed. As soon as Louise Beaumont seemed tolerably disengaged, both Monsieur Beaumont and Philippe asked her if she might be prevailed for some music.

“As we are all friends here,” Monsieur Beaumont said kindly. “You will not be as shy as you sometimes are.”

“I will play with great pleasure,” Louise assured them all. “But my voice is weak tonight so I shall not sing.”

“Let me see your music, Madame,” Monsieur Fabron said generously. “And I shall attempt to oblige the company.”

He perused the collection of songs gathered on the piano. To buy music was one of the delights of Louise Beaumont’s life and Luc encouraged her to indulge in it.

“Ah,” Monsieur Fabron said, finding a song to his liking. “If Madame will play _Ce n’est plus Lisette_ , I shall sing!”

“You mean to show off your melancholy disposition, Adrien,” Philippe laughed.

“My dear Philippe, next to you the most high-spirited of men would appear inconsolably depressed,” Monsieur Fabron answered.

Louise silenced Philippe’s reply by beginning her play and Monsieur Fabron sang. His voice was deep and his skill considerable. Everybody listened to him with pleasure, but Javert’s attention was invariably fixed on Mademoiselle Beaumont, wishing very much to know whether it was the voice or the man she was admiring at present. When the song ended and Monsieur Fabron had been properly thanked, Philippe rose to his feet and declared he would sing as well.

“Find me something light-hearted, Louisa!” he said. “For I will need the aid of a spirited melody to hide the deficiencies of my voice.”

Philippe’s singing was by no means as good as Monsieur Fabron’s. It was not his voice that was deficient, but he had certainly not practiced like the latter obviously did. His choice of song and cheerful manner were greatly preferred by the children, however, who were not too shy to dance around the furniture. Their spirits were so high that when Philippe finished, Camille clutched at Marion’s skirt and begged:

“Sing _La petite fée_ , aunt Marion! Please!”

Her brother joined her eagerly and Marion smilingly walked to the piano.

“Very well,” she said.

“What do you say?” their mother said from behind her instrument.

“Merci, aunt Marion!” the children chimed.

Marion laughed and sang, encouraging the children to join in where they could. Javert watched her with a smile that he had almost become accustomed to wearing. He did not notice Philippe’s glances in his direction and his eyes only left Marion’s face to watch the children frolic past his feet.

“Let us have some duets!” Philippe exclaimed as soon as Marion had finished. “I daresay there is enough talent in this room to contrive it.”

“I would be more than happy to sing with Mademoiselle Marion,” Monsieur Fabron said, rising from his seat with alacrity.

Marion quickly took up the music for a particular song and held it out to him when he reached the piano.

“I am afraid this will not do for me,” he said with a shake of the head. “This piece calls for notes I shall not be able to reach.”

“Perhaps Monsieur Javert would attempt it,” Philippe said cheerfully. “You are a tenor, are you not, Monsieur?”

“I am not in the habit of singing, Monsieur,” Javert made excuse.

“Look,” Marion said, coming towards him with the music. “It is a song from the concert we attended. You spoke well of it at the time, would you not like to try it?”

Her eyes were fixed on him with a tenderness that made him look away.

“Come, Monsieur!” Philippe exclaimed. “You have heard my abominable performance so there cannot be any scruples as regards to excellence.”

Javert gave in and moved to the piano. Louise played and Marion started the first verse. It was impossible that Javert should sing with the skill of a man used to the employment, but he had a good ear and his memory was very exact, so he remembered the way the song had been sung at the concert. So when he sang he did the song all the justice an amateur could command. His voice was strong and clear and Marion’s evident admiration gave spirit to his intonation.

“Well done, Monsieur,” Monsieur Beaumont spoke admiringly when the duet came to an end.

“A fine performance,” Luc nodded.

Marion smiled at Javert and then hid her face while placing the music back amidst the other songs.

Monsieur Fabron had seen enough to suspect that a slight change in his manners would be appropriate and Marion was relieved to see him withdraw some of his attentions for the rest of the evening. Javert did not pretend to understand what exactly had passed between Marion and Monsieur Fabron, but the change did not escape his notice and he saw enough to quiet his fears.

“May I offer an observation on your character, Monsieur?” Marion said, after having seen Javert pulled about by little Constantin to be shown a favourite toy.

“By all means,” Javert answered, sitting down by her on the sofa.

“I am surprised by your patience, Monsieur,” she smiled, glancing at the children.

“You had not expected me to possess the trait?” Javert asked.

“Not in such an astonishing degree,” Marion said laughingly.

He smiled.

“Not very long ago my father enquired of me whether I had come to fully comprehend your character,” Marion said in a low voice. “But you see you still surprise me.”

Javert looked at her in surprise and she gave him a gentle, but very meaningful smile. He wondered what the rest of the conversation with her father she had eluded to had contained. “And what was your answer at the time?” he asked, in a similar tone.

“That I comprehended it enough to value it very highly,” Marion answered, her courage rising every moment and quite aware of her father smiling quietly to himself while pretending to talk to Philippe.

When Javert did not attempt to answer her, Marion added: “I believe you once thought there were things you might tell me about yourself that would sink you in my opinion.”

“Yes,” Javert answered, averting his eyes.

“Do you still have such confessions to make?” Marion asked, glad of the amount of noise Philippe was making with the children at that moment.

Javert looked at her and answered, slightly taken aback by the brightness of her eyes: “I believe not.”

“I am glad of it,” Marion said cheerfully. “Because even if there were, their sinking me in your opinion would be utterly impossible.”

As he looked at her Javert was fully convinced Mademoiselle Beaumont meant every single word she had just said to him and that she had not made this communication by accident. He was not sure what could be answered to such a speech, but Marion did not require an answer. She gently took up another topic of conversation and he entered into it with great pleasure.

The rest of the evening carried on in great comfort, with pleasant talk, lively music and much noise from the children. Towards the end of the evening, after the children had been carried off by the nursery maid, he found himself addressed by Philippe Beaumont in a rather more serious accent than he had ever heard the young man take. They talked of business and the trials of life for a while and after listening gravely to a speech on the subject of duty Philippe sighed and shook his head.

“I have always worked hard, Monsieur,” he said. “In that respect I have fulfilled the duty you speak of, but sometimes it seems enough to wear a man down.”

After a short silence Javert said: “Your sister tells me you travel a great deal, that when you leave Paris it is never for the same place.”

“That is very true,” Philippe answered. “My business requires it.”

“A man’s work can define him,” Javert said slowly. “I think indeed it must do so, but it is worth considering that a man might alter the manner in which he carries out his business, without changing too much of who he is.”

Philippe looked at him. “What do you mean, Monsieur?” he asked.

“I have moved from place to place myself for many years,” Javert answered. “And have found that the isolation such a lifestyle necessarily involves is perhaps not conducive to a man’s spirits.”

Philippe bowed his head. “Lack of spirits is not usually something I am accused of,” he said with a wry smile.

“I accuse you of nothing, Monsieur,” Javert said seriously. “I would merely advise you to consider that the burden of travel might be more easily borne if one is in the possession of a home to return to.”

Philippe did not answer this speech, but he nodded and when it was time to take leave he shook Javert’s hand with a sober sincerity that was unusual for him to display.

In Marion’s goodbye to Javert there was nothing of soberness. Between his consenting to sing with her and his kindness to the children her feelings were so strongly affected that she was excessively sorry to see him go.

…

Javert required the quiet and darkness of Paris by night to be able to think clearly. He did not return to his lodgings immediately, but chose to walk the streets in the dark as he had often done before his accident. Those times now seemed a lifetime ago. He walked slower now than he did then and his cane made a distinctive sound on the cobblestones to remind him he was not the same man.

Walking with careful steps Javert considered all that had happened. He could clearly recall every look and word Mademoiselle Beaumont had ever bestowed on him. Unreal and incredible as everything still seemed to him, he was at least finally convinced that Marion Beaumont truly cared for him. Even this conviction was not enough to make him easy, because it still seemed very unlikely to him that she would ever consent to marry him. Her family’s circumstances were so decidedly above his own and he must consider that she had had her reasons to never marry before. Even if she did not give any weight to his personal disadvantages, an unwillingness to leave her father might still prevent her from accepting him.

One thing he was very certain of, however, the offer must be made. He could not continue to be silent. Not after he had been led to behave towards her as he had done. One more confession would have to be made after all and it would have to be done as soon as possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Only one chapter remains I think, and we all know what must happen…
> 
> I want to thank my reader Groucha for her insights on the status of policemen in 1830's France that helped me write the conversation between Marion and her father.
> 
> About the music:
> 
> 'Ce n'est plus Lisette' (It is Lisette no more) is a song by Pierre-Jean de Béranger, I think he wrote it around 1816. It's about a man who meets with a former lover and is shocked to find her more beautiful and finely dressed than she has ever been.
> 
> 'La petite fée' (The little fairy) is a song by the same author, from 1817 and tells of a fairy that is godmother to a king and ensures his kingdom thrives.


	11. Part Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Javert and Marion receive their happy ending.

The very next day, which was a Saturday, Javert called on Monsieur Beaumont. Monsieur Beaumont was surprised, but by no means displeased.

“I am glad you no longer scruple to call on me without ceremony,” he said earnestly. “It is treating me like a friend indeed.”

Javert thanked him and assured him of his respect and friendship. They talked for some minutes, but Monsieur Beaumont was very aware of Javert’s absence of mind. He was not at all surprised therefore when his guest suddenly rose and asked whether Mademoiselle Beaumont was at home.

“Indeed she is, Monsieur,” he answered calmly.

“I wondered if I might talk privately to your daughter, Monsieur,” Javert asked with a bow.

The smile on Monsieur Beaumont’s face was hardly visible. “I believe you will find her in the garden,” he answered. “And I am sure there is no one she would so readily forgive for interrupting her solitude as you, Monsieur.”

Javert hesitated for a moment and then bowed silently. Monsieur Beaumont nodded and watched him go with a small shake of the head. If any father can be supposed to feel not even a twinge of sadness when thinking of his daughter’s engagement, Monsieur Beaumont must be that father.

The garden was small and upon entering it Javert immediately saw Marion. She was seated on a little stone bench and seemed engrossed in a book. He stood hesitantly, knowing his cane would make a distinctive sound on the garden path that would announce his presence. Decisively he stepped forward. Marion looked up from her book.

“Monsieur Javert!” she exclaimed, rising from her seat.

Having reached her, he touched her extended hand lightly and with a smile Marion sat down again.

“Do sit down,” she invited him when he did not immediately follow her example.

He sat down.

“I wish to thank you for your kind and wise words to my brother the other night,” Marion said. “He has told me you have made him think a great deal.”

“I did not know he mentioned our conversation to you,” Javert said.

“Oh,” Marion smiled. “I am a very impertinent sister, I make a point of making my brothers tell me all their thoughts and concerns.”

“I expect there is not much force involved at all,” Javert replied with a smile.

Marion laughed softly. “Whatever the case may be, Phillip told me your words made a great impression on him.”

“I merely cautioned him against the possible consequences of a life spent travelling from city to city,” Javert said. “As I am intimately acquainted with them.”

“And I do thank you for it,” Marion said emphatically. “If my brother were to listen to anyone it should be to such a man as you…”

“Mademoiselle Beaumont,” Javert said suddenly, unable to wait for a more appropriate moment.

She looked at him in surprise, hardly ever having heard him speak in a raised voice.

“I do not know,” he said with forced calmness. “That is to say, I do not trust my own judgement on this matter, but I am under the persuasion that – however undeserved – I am in some way in the possession of your affections.”

Marion looked at him with a quiet, open expression.

“For a woman in your position,” he continued with great exertion. “Many things must of course be taken in to consideration, but if I may be allowed I would wish to enquire-” He drew a deep breath. “I would wish to enquire if it would be at all possible for you to consider changing your name?”

The moment of silence that followed seemed unbearably long to Javert, but it was really only the time it took for Marion to smile.

“Assuring you that a change of name would in no way be disagreeable to me,” she said with a very expressive smile. “And also confirming that you are indeed in the possession of my warmest affections, could I entreat you to make your enquiry more fully?”

Javert felt his face glow. He saw Marion’s hand move and in an impulse he took it in his and pressed it warmly. The feelings that took hold of him were entirely new to him and they made him speak without quite knowing how he exactly expressed himself.

“Mademoiselle Beaumont,” he began.

“Under the present circumstances,” Marion said feelingly. “Would it not suffice to call me Mademoiselle Marion?”

Javert’s voice failed him for a moment and he was forced to look away.

“Dear Mademoiselle,” he began again, struggling to compose himself as he looked at her again. “I can have no proper right to address a lady such as yourself and you surely have very little reason to accept my proposal. But having long felt feelings towards you that have never been inspired in me by any other person, I must tell you that if you were to grant me your hand in marriage you would bring be a happiness I formerly did not believe to exist in this world.”

Marion’s cheeks were burning red and her eyes were full of brilliant light. She gave Javert every possible encouragement short of speaking, for at that very moment her heart was blocking her throat.

“I am fully prepared to wait for your answer,” he added. “I do not expect an answer at this moment and understand that you will probably wish to consult your family.”

But by this time Marion had recovered the use of her voice. “You are quite wrong, you know,” she said, brimming with happiness. “In supposing I have little reason to accept your suit. Among many others, one very great inducement must be that since you are so very reluctant for me to change my name to yours, I have high hopes of you at last calling me by my Christian name when my name is no longer Mademoiselle Beaumont.”

Javert looked at her with a wild hope mixed with uncertainty, as if he did not quite understand her speech.

“I myself, however,” Marion continued with trembling voice. “Will in future have the greatest pleasure imaginable in introducing myself as Madame Javert.”

Javert grasped her hand more tightly. He smiled a smile that temporarily swept away all the ragged lines that grief had left on his face. “Arrangements will have to be made, of course,” he said hastily. “My present abode is in no way fit to receive you, nor will you wish to move so far from your family. But a new house shall be taken and it shall be of your choosing entirely-”

“Monsieur… Emile,” Marion interrupted him warmly. “Arrangements can wait.”

Javert looked into her happy face and was silent. Marion sat beside him, simply revelling in the delicious certainty of love and happiness. For two people so unlikely to be united, she thought, cannot avoid being blissfully happy once they have contrived to be together.

“I am glad,” she said after a while. “That you spoke to me when you did, or else I must have exposed myself in trying to convince you of my feelings.”

“Were you expecting my offer?” Javert asked her, genuinely surprised.

“I have been wishing for it,” Marion smiled. “For as long as I’ve loved you.”

“As long as you’ve loved me…” Javert repeated in amazement.

“Do not ask me how long I have loved you,” Marion entreated. “For I really do not know. Looking back my concern, my esteem and my love all blend together.”

“I am convinced I have loved you since the first time I saw you,” Javert said sincerely. “Or the second at least.”

Perhaps this could not be considered an objective truth, but the memory of a man in love must be allowed to play tricks on him.

“No,” Marion exclaimed. “Not that long. Not when I was offending your dignity by reading to you without even your own consent.” She shook her head. “I have long felt ashamed of that.”

“Ashamed?” Javert said feelingly. “Ashamed of visiting a doomed man out of the goodness of your heart and your devotion to charity?”

Marion blushed.

“Yes, I loved you then, even if I dared not admit it at the time,” he said.

“And here I was thinking you had disapproved of me,” laughed Marion.

Javert pressed her hand. “I, disapprove of you?” he said. “With so much to blame myself for?”

“Ah,” Marion shook her head and laughed.

“I must go,” Javert said, taking up his cane. “I have yet to ask your father’s consent, Mademoiselle.”

Marion had risen with him, but she had not withdrawn her hand. “If that is how you must take leave of your fiancée, Monsieur Emile,” she said.

Javert turned round, saw her expression and paused. He still held her hand and looking at her he lifted it to his lips and kissed it.  “My dearest Marion,” he said earnestly.

She smiled at him with more delight than she had ever felt before and allowed him to go to her father.

Monsieur Beaumont gave his consent most readily and her brothers expressed their hearty approbation of the match as soon as they were informed of it. Marion’s whole family shared her happiness. They would have shared it for no other reason than her feeling it, but respecting Javert as they did, they all truly rejoiced in their engagement. If the rest of Paris society was surprised at the spinster daughter of Monsieur Beaumont marrying a former police inspector, it did not prevent them from wishing the couple well, but to tell the truth the newly engaged Marion really did not have the time to concern herself with what strangers thought of her.

 

As for Javert, his happiness was even greater than Marion’s, because to him it was a feeling almost entirely new and unexpected. As the wedding day drew near and the arrangements of houses, servants and trousseaus were dealt with, he seemed finally able to trust in his own happiness. The respectful congratulations of his former and present colleagues flowed in continually and he felt assured of Marion’s love as well as of the approbation of her family and friends.

“Do you approve of Madame Bisset?” Javert asked Marion one afternoon.

They were walking down the boulevard and she was leaning on his arm with the assurance of his strength not failing him.

Marion laughed. “I think your housekeeper’s happiness in our engagement quite equals our own,” she said.

“You approve of her then?” he smiled.

“Indeed I do,” Marion laughed.

“I could not have known,” Javert sighed. “I would ever inhabit a house with a mistress to preside over it.”

“And such a perfect house it is,” Marion smiled.

“You truly think so, Marion?” Javert asked her earnestly.

She smiled at him, still delighted to hear him pronouncing her name. “It will be more than perfect, Emile,” she assured him. “When its owner will be my husband.”

…

Nothing is left to be said that cannot be better imagined in silence. Let it suffice to say that happiness, in as complete a form as it may be enjoyed under the circumstances of this case, was what followed. What this happiness entailed it is really not necessary to relate.

If Javert could ever be forgiven for the choices he made and the blood he himself saw on his hands, let all be assured that Marion forgave him all his past sins and rewarded all his past and present virtues. As Madame Javert she was as loved as she had ever been as Mademoiselle Beaumont and as a husband Emile Javert reaped more reward and praise than he had ever done as an inspector of the first class.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you are reading this, thank you so much for sticking with my story till the end. I hope this was a satisfying ending!
> 
> I always knew this was going to end with a proposal. In fact a long time ago, when I still wanted this story to be linked more closely to the musical, I wrote the proposal in lyrics:
> 
> _"Your spirit and your kindness,_  
>  May they always be the same.  
> But if the idea is pleasing,  
> Would the lady change her name?" 
> 
> I still love that phrasing, but I'm glad my story turned out the way it did and I was not sorry to abandon poetry for prose.
> 
> This was my first serious fanfiction, I had a great time writing it and I would love to hear what you think about it. All reviews and critiques are greatly appreciated!


	12. Epilogue ~ The Streets of Paris

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For those who do not wish to imagine in silence...

It was a great pleasure to Javert to attend church with his wife. Since he had taken a house in the same quartièr as the Beaumonts they now all frequented the same church. To go to church with one’s extended family was new to him and Javert had to admit it was a distraction from the act of worship. Philippe Beaumont was not as solemn as he ought to be and Camille and Constantin, of course, required attention and instruction. But these inconveniences were insignificant compared to the joy of walking into the house of God with Marion on his arm and seeing her seated beside him, all quiet attention and loveliness.

Perhaps it was as well that Philippe was careful not to let Javert hear him whenever he teased his sister: “I declare, your husband is worse than Papa. I feel obliged to sit up straight all through the mass and keep my head up for every sermon, because I am sure he would not scruple to chide me publicly if I were to fidget.”

“Well,” Marion smiled. “I am glad to have you with us still and at church we are all together, it is like old times.”

“Like old times indeed,” Philippe laughed. “Where I would get chided because I would fidget and you would get praised, even though you could no more repeat the sermon than I could.”

A smile passed across Marion’s lips that looked a lot more like Philippe’s grin than her own usual sweet smile. “You should have learned, like myself, how to be absent-minded without being fidgety,” she replied.

If Javert ever suspected that his wife’s interest in the priest’s words was not equal to his own, he certainly never doubted her devotion. She clearly took as much pleasure in being by his side in church as he did.

After mass, if the weather was fine, Marion usually persuaded Javert to take her to one of the public gardens. Sometimes they took a walk on the boulevard, occasionally they went to a museum, but they stayed away from the Champs Elysees. It’s appearance on Sunday afternoons reminded Javert too much of a fair and the noise was odious to him.

One Sunday when the family made ready to return to their respective homes, where a luncheon would be waiting for them, Monsieur Beaumont asked Javert: “And where will you and Madame Javert be off to this afternoon? Shall it be the Jardin des Plantes or the Jardin du Luxembourg today?”

“I believe it will be neither,” Javert answered. “My wife has expressed a disinclination for taking the air today.”

“You are newlyweds yet,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled. “And the home must therefore possess equal charms to the outside world.”

“Greater charms, I should say,” Javert smiled back.

Marion came towards them with Camille and Constantin, followed by Luc and Louisa Beaumont.

…

“It is extraordinary to me,” Marion said, breaking a rather long silence in the drawing room. “That artists are willing to publish a work of their own under another name. An artistic creating, close as it must be to a creator’s heart, ought not to be denied its parentage in such a way.”

Javert listened to her reflections on the subject and after offering some of his own he added: “Was it the formation of these thoughts that has kept you so quiet, ma chère?”

“No indeed,” Marion smiled. “I did not feel quite well this morning, but I am much better now.” She glanced out of the window. It was remarkably fine weather for the time of year.

“Do you wish to go out after all?” Javert asked.

“No…” Marion said hesitantly. “I shall not insist upon it, not after wanting to stay in.”

Javert smiled. “I do not dislike our excursions, you know,” he said. “I spend my working hours indoors nowadays, while most of my life I had been used to spend the on the streets. It makes it very agreeable for me to walk out with you.”

Marion smiled happily. “Then let’s walk out, mon chéri,” she said cheerfully. “Will you take me walking past the places where you used to work?”

They had done this once or twice before. Marion had always wished to see more of Paris than she usually had the opportunity to do and, as her husband, Javert might take her wherever he pleased. She also loved to hear him talk of what Javert knew she secretly thought of as his adventures. Javert’s inclination for talking about himself was not equal to Marion’s curiosity, but he was too fond of her to deny her anything she took such obvious pleasure in.

“I might show you the last place I worked,” he replied. “I know you have long wished to see it.”

Marion was surprised, she had never asked him to take her to the scene of the rebellion. “I have,” she confessed. “But I would not want to bring you where it is painful for you to be.”

“If it is painful for me to walk those streets it is because of my own actions,” Javert answered. “And I am not inclined to let my present actions be dictated by phantoms of the past.”

Marion still looked concerned, but Javert smiled and asked: “Do you wish to see it?”

“Very much,” she replied.

“Then we will go,” he said decisively.

…

The day continued fine and the sun was still shining when Monsieur and Madame Javert dismissed their coach. They would walk as long as they liked and take a hackney coach to return home. As Marion took Javert’s arm, it occurred to him how strange it was to walk these streets with her. She who was now the most important person in his life, but of whose existence he had not even known when he walked them last.

Marion looked around, surprised. “Are we not near the Louvre?” she asked.

“Very near,” Javert agreed.

“I…I had not expected it to be so close,” Marion confessed, a little disconcerted.

“Is hard to think of art and tragedy sharing a neighbourhood?” he asked.

“A little,” Marion smiled. “But it should not be so, after all tragedy is one of the inexhaustible sources of artistic inspiration.”

“I do not pretend to understand the ways of artists,” Javert smiled. “But I shall take your word for it.”

They walked at a very gentle pace, talking quietly to each other and looking around by turns.

“These streets are calmer now than they used to be,” Javert remarked.

“You have never come back here since?” Marion asked.

“I have not,” he replied. “I believe I was here last on the 7th of June 1832.”

Marion could have smiled and observed that ever his memories were meticulous, but she did not. Instead she held onto his arm a little tighter and listened quietly to his descriptions of events and people. She looked about her placidly. The streets seemed utterly ordinary to her. Perhaps she had expected more, or worse.

A woman carrying a basket of flowers drew near them and then immediately shrank away under Javert’s stern look. Marion smiled at her, however, and the woman was bold enough to curtsy and mumble:

“Bonjour, Madame.”

Marion gently let go of Javert’s arm and approached her. “Let me see your wares, good woman,” she said kindly.

“Certainly, Madame,” the woman replied, showing Marion her flowers.

“What sweet little bouquets,” Marion smiled. “I think I will have the white one with the blue ribbon.”

“Thank you, Madame,” the woman said, giving Marion the bouquet.

Marion handed the woman more money than was expected and received a grateful curtsy.

“Thank you, Madame, bless you, Madame,” the woman said and she drew quickly drew back again.

Javert hid a smile as Marion took his arm again. She held the flowers in her left hand as he held his cane in his right. They turned into the Rue Mondétour. Javert’s face grew graver as they progressed, but Marion was not worried. She had learned by now when to talk to divert his attention and when to keep quiet and wait. She waited.

“This is the place called Corinthe,” he said, nodding in the direction of the wine-shop of sorts.

“And that is where…” Marion began.

“Yes,” Javert replied gravely.

He had stopped walking without realizing it. Javert’s memory was painfully exact and had he wished to do so, he could have pointed out to Marion the exact walls against which the barricade had leaned. He was convinced he could have retraced the exact stones upon which the dead were lined up, but he did not say any of this. He only said this:

“I see their faces still.”

Marion was aware of some people looking at them from behind doors and drapes and she was sorry for the pained expression on her husband’s face. Gently she tugged on his arm and made him walk again. As they walked, side by side, both of them considered that if it had not been for the dreadful events that took place here, they would never have met.

“They were very young, were they not?” Marion asked in a low voice.

“Not all of them were, but some of them excessively so,” Javert replied.

There was a short silence and then Javert began to talk of the things he had seen as a spy. He quoted some of the words spoken and recalled some particular scenes of insubordination mixed with bravery.

He kept his voice low, but his accent was neither gentle, nor emotional. Javert spoke of what had happened with a certain detachment that came from his conviction of every single person involved in the business being wrong, and that included himself. Perhaps there was one man for whom he was willing to make an exception, but it was an exception made in his mind alone and never spoken out loud. This was not a confession after all. Javert had never talked to Marion to confess, he talked to her because he wished her to know him. Eventually he fell silent and Marion, who had grown very thoughtful, began to look about her for a place to rest awhile. She was not tired, in fact she was a very good walker, but she always took care to feign fatigue long before her husband’s legs could start to trouble him. As they crossed the street, her eye fell on the church of Saint-Leu-Saint-Gilles. Its doors were open.

“What a fine-looking church,” she remarked. “I would very much like to see it and perhaps sit for a while.”

“Of course,” Javert agreed.

They walked to the church and entered it quietly. As they passed by the altar, they bent their heads slightly and then they chose a seat beside a tall column. For a while they sat there in silence. Only one other person was in the church at that moment, an old woman praying in hushed tones.

“Did you ever find out their names?” Marion asked quietly, watching Javert with gentle eyes.

“Of the revolutionaries?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Their names were not published,” he said.

“I know this,” Marion said, smiling sadly.

Javert looked uneasy for a moment. “I know some names,” he said. “But I have endeavoured to forget them.”

“You did not pass them on?” Marion asked.

“What good would it do?” Javert replied. “It would only serve to blacken the names of families who already suffered under the loss of a son.”

Marion laid her hand upon his. There was another long silence.

“You are wanting to ask me something,” Javert said after a while. “I can tell by the way you slant your head.”

Marion looked at him and he smiled. “You speak of the men behind the barricade,” she said. “But what of your brother officers?”

Javert did not answer.

“Did many of them fall?” Marion asked gently.

“Not as many as might have,” Javert replied. “But certainly too many.”

Marion looked at the empty church and sighed.

“There were other barricades,” Javert resumed calmly. “Other men…”

Marion nodded gravely. “Many men on many sides,” she said. “Well, they shall share one candle.”

She rose from her seat and made her way to the side altar for the virgin Mary. Javert watched her light a candle and followed the elegant movements of her hand as she made the sign of the cross. He joined her by the altar and looked at the little flame flickering among the others. Silently Marion took his arm and they walked slowly out of the church, back into the determined afternoon sunshine.

“It would be you,” Javert said softly. “To light a candle.”

Marion looked at him. “What do you mean by that, mon cher?” she asked with a smile.

“You are moved by every evil that befalls mankind,” Javert said. “Regardless of the circumstances. You would cry for my brother officers as sincerely as you would cry for the rebels they fought.”

“If I would it would be for reasons you have yourself already admitted to be true,” Marion said.

“And what is that reason?” Javert asked.

“That they are all someone’s son,” Marion replied.

Javert did not smile, but he almost smiled.

“Think of my sentiments what you will, dear husband,” Marion said, attempting to sound playful again. “As long as you are assured of one thing…”

Javert gave her an inquisitive look.

“…that my tears for you would have been equal to none.”

Javert gave her a look that spoke of his feelings, but he did not put them into words. He looked down and, clearing his throat, said: “You have misplaced your flowers.”

“I have left them on the altar,” Marion said gently.

Javert nodded and they kept walking.

“There is another place I would like to show you,” Javert said, when they had left the church far behind. “But it is across the river.”

“We are not pressed for time, are we?” Marion smiled. “So we may do whatever pleases us.”

“Indeed we may,” Javert agreed.

So Monsieur and Madame Javert walked the afternoon away, only returning home when the sun began to announce its departure. They were not a lively couple, but one would truly be hard pressed to find a mutual affection equal to theirs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *sigh*, I just couldn’t say goodbye to these characters yet. (......I may or may not be working on another one-shot epilogue about their first child.........)
> 
> Shout-out to my sister who is reading the Brick and suggested that M and Mme Javert might take a walk in some familiar places. And to Groucha for pointing out that this was basically Javert's "Empty Chairs and Empty Tables".
> 
> Hope you enjoyed!


	13. Epilogue ~ Compassion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Javert becomes a father and receives all the happiness that comes with it.

Whenever Louisa Beaumont visited Madame Javert the latter was usually the liveliest of the two. Lately this had not always been the case, however. Marion was often tired and even though Louisa was a very gentle and not at all nosy person, curiosity was starting to get the better of her. One afternoon when Marion sighed a complaint on the subject of aching feet and change in appetite, Louisa gave her an expressive smile and finally asked the question which had been on her mind for a while now:

“How long have you known?”

Marion coloured. She had not meant to betray herself. Perhaps she had forgotten that Louisa was a mother and would naturally be of a quicker understanding in these matters than others.

“Almost two months,” she confessed. “But I wanted to be sure.”

Louisa lifted up her eyes in surprise. “You have not told your husband yet?” she asked.

Marion shook her head. She was quite assured of Javert’s joy on receiving the news, but she also considered that a great many changes had befallen him in a relatively short period of time. If she was to acquaint him with the arrival of another change, she wished to be absolutely certain of its taking place.

Louisa smiled. “You must tell him soon then,” she advised. “And see a doctor.”

Marion laughed softly. “Once I have told him I shall have no choice but to see one,” she assured Louisa.

...

Marion was correct in this assumption, as she found out a week later. She had decided that she really must tell Javert soon, or he would start to perceive the changes in her and mistake them for ill health. To worry him was the least of her wishes and so the following Saturday, when they were comfortably seated in the drawing room after supper, she told him.

Javert sat very still while Marion spoke to him, equal parts happiness and terror mingling in his mind. He looked at Marion’s rosy face and felt a pride and affection that until that moment he had never felt united. Before he could put these feelings into words, however, he was oppressed by the thought of Marion’s health and the dangers that necessarily accompanied even the most favourable births. He got to his feet abruptly and said:

“We must contact a physician directly.”

Marion smiled.

“And a nurse,” Javert said, starting to pace through the room. “A nurse must be hired to care for you.”

“I think the hiring of a nurse might wait until the moment of my confinement,” Marion said gently, the smile still on her lips. “But I have no objection to seeing a physician.”

Javert turned round and gave her a look of alarm and feeling. “Dearest Marion,” he said, sitting down beside her and taking her hand.

“Are you happy, mon chéri?” Marion asked.

“Words could not express it,” he said earnestly.

“Then I shall express it for both of us,” she said. “I am so _perfectly_ happy. I feel too richly rewarded and too perfectly answered in all my wishes. Wishes too that I had long ago accepted as remaining always unfulfilled!”

Javert smiled at her, agreeing with her in a silence that was heavy with thought but light because it was so full of happiness.

“You must tell Claire to make over some of her duties to the new scullery maid so she can devote more of her time to you,” Javert said when he had gained the full use of his faculties again. “Remind me, what was the name of the new maid?”

“Nicolette,” Marion answered. “And I have a notion that a disproportionate number of maids go by that name.”

Javert gave her a bemused smiled. “Are you sure about not hiring a nurse?” he said with a concerned frown.

“Quite sure,” Marion smiled. “I will manage very well with Claire to help me.”

Javert nodded. “And you are well?” he asked. “You are not suffering?”

“Not at all,” Marion assured him. “A little fatigue but nothing to speak of.”

 

The doctor agreed with Marion that hiring a nurse could certainly wait. “Your wife is in excellent health,” he assured Javert. “So there is no cause for alarm.”

Marion smiled at Javert’s visible relief.

“I recommend you make no extraordinary changes to your diet, Madame,” the doctor advised. “But do not eat too much in one sitting and abstain from liquors and salted meat. Fresh produce is the thing.”

Marion nodded.

“Are you fond of walking, Madame?” he enquired.

“Indeed I am,” she replied.

“Then I advise you to indulge frequently in that habit,” he said. “But never allow yourself to get worn out by the exercise.”

“I shall see to it that I don’t,” she replied, glancing smilingly at Javert.

“Excellent,” the doctor nodded. “Then I merely have to add my sincere congratulations, Monsieur and Madame Javert.”

They thanked him and after his departure Marion had the pleasure of seeing Javert looking considerably more at ease. “When do you wish to tell your family?” he asked. His expression and voice now contained more of a quiet pride instead of the anxious seriousness of a few moments ago.

“Louisa has found me out already,” Marion smiled. “But she will not tell. I think we should wait a little longer, do not you?”

He nodded, contemplating for a while how unfortunate it was at a time like this that Marion’s family afforded her with only one female relation. Involuntarily his thoughts turned to his own mother. His memories of her were not extensive, but he had never allowed himself to forget her. For as long as he remembered he had condemned her in his mind.

Marion had risen and was now speaking to Madame Bisset, who was congratulating her with tears in her eyes. Since the doctor had been called, all the servants of the house had been quite anxious to know what was going on and Marion felt that the old housekeeper truly meant every kind word she spoke. She was not aware of Javert observing her silently, deep in thought and with a silent frown in his eyes. Marion, he thought, was everything his mother was not and could never have been. And yet, they would both be mothers.

There were many things Javert had told Marion that he had always thought he would never voluntarily talk about. His parentage, however, he had never mentioned again since that one time in the hospital that now seemed a lifetime ago. Had he chosen to speak of his mother now, Marion might have suggested she shared more with her than he thought. She might have said they should be similar at least in their love for him and Javert would have disagreed with her. He did not speak of her, however, and was awoken from his reflections only when Marion spoke to him.

“I have changed my mind,” she said smilingly, when Madame Bisset quitting the room with a curtsy. “I would like to tell Papa and my brothers after all.”

Javert smiled at her. “It would be cruel perhaps, would it not?” he said. “To keep all this happiness to ourselves?”

“Very cruel,” Marion agreed.

...

The joy which their communication caused among Marion’s family can easily be imagined. Monsieur Beaumont was overjoyed. He embraced them both and could not congratulate them warmly enough to do justice to his feelings. Philippe went unusually quiet, but smiled incessantly and Luc confessed privately to Marion that he was not only glad, but rather relieved. Marion thanked him silently for his concern and then Luc quickly changed the subject by crying out to his wife:

“You have been very sly, ma chère.”

“I was sworn to secrecy,” Louisa smiled.

“It is a good thing,” Philippe said cheerfully. “That you women have each other to confide in, because we men could never have kept such a secret.”

Marion laughed, but she soon had to turn all her attention to her father, who was enquiring very particularly after her health.

“My dear child,” he said when she had quieted his concerns. “You remind me more of your mother each day.”

Marion kissed his cheek affectionately and laughed at Philippe when he cried out:

“Oh yes, you shall be just like our mother! You shall have two boys and one girl and you will be forever running after them to get them to mind their manners and learn their letters. But they will do neither and they will be so beastly to their governess that they will drive her to distraction, but so sweet to the cook that she will fill them with sweets.”

“If a child is beastly,” Javert said. “That is most likely the fault of the governess and it is her business not to be driven to distraction.”

“Very true,” Louisa smiled. “And I do not think that Monsieur and Madame Javert’s children will turn out anything like that. Mine never did and I think they take after _their_ father a great deal.”

Marion smiled at her husband and he smiled back. He was always the quietest individual at the family gatherings, but the Beaumonts had learned not to force him into talking and he was now very comfortable in their company. In any case, it was very pleasing that they shared his and Marion’s happiness and he depended on them for support, especially for Marion.

When they parted he mentioned this, telling them all that it would not at all be unwelcome if their visits to Marion during the day would become more frequent. After all, he was absent during the day almost without exception.

“You just try and keep me away, brother,” Philippe laughed.

Monsieur Beaumont expressed a similar sentiment and Louisa assured him that she had long ago promised Marion to be with her whenever she was needed or wanted.

“Oh, what a lovely evening,” Marion sighed when they were seated in their carriage and on their way home.

Javert nodded, his head filled with thoughts on family life and families in general. To be a father, he felt, would not be just another duty to fulfil, it would be much more than that.

...

Weeks went by calmly and pleasantly. Marion was in high spirits and Javert was slowly getting used to the idea of being a father and the head of a proper family. The more he thought about it, the more eagerness he felt. His wife had never looked more lovely to him and her health really did not seem to be at all affected by her condition.

“My father’s old housekeeper says my mother was much worse in her time,” Marion said. “I am blessed with my father’s strong constitution.”

“I remember nurse Comtois at the hospital saying something to that effect,” Javert recollected.

Marion smiled. They were at that moment returning from a walk and just about to step back inside the house. Paul answered the door and stepped aside to let them in.

“Have you had a pleasant walk, Madame, Monsieur?” he asked.

“A lovely walk,” Marion replied. “Thank you Paul, I…” Her voice trailed off and she raised her hand to her face. Marion suddenly felt very lightheaded. The house seemed stuffy after the fresh air outside. She swayed on her feet and nearly fainted.

Javert started as she grasped his arm and put nearly her full weight on him. He braced his stiff legs and supported her. “Marion!” he exclaimed.

Marion took a deep breath and managed to overcome the faintness, but she did feel very nauseated. Paul scrambled to fetch his mistress a chair and Javert guided her to it and gently sat her down. As soon as she was seated Marion felt better and she smiled at Javert in an attempt to calm him.

“I felt faint for a moment,” she explained. “But I feel better already.”

“You are very pale,” Javert said, with a fretfulness to his voice that was most uncharacteristic.

“I am well, I promise you,” Marion declared.

Javert would not yield, however. He insisted on the doctor being called. The doctor, once arrived, immediately assured him that this was nothing out of the ordinary. The only new advice he gave was to make sure all the rooms of the house were kept well aired, especially the bedroom.

“Fresh air and gentle smells will be most beneficial to your wife at this time,” he said kindly. “But let me repeat that these measures are simply to add to her comfort, her health is not in danger either way.”

“Would this not be the time to hire a nurse?” Javert enquired, not fully appeased.

“Monsieur, your wife is in excellent health,” the doctor repeated. “There is really no hurry, but as you will, of course, want to be assured your wife is in the best of hands, it may be wise to start making enquiries. I would certainly be glad to give you some names.”

Javert bowed his agreement and Marion took care to mention several times how well taken care of she was at the moment with Claire and Madame Bisset taking every trouble to make her comfortable. This was certainly true. Monsieur and Madame Javert were very fortunate in the characters of their servants. The maid, Claire, was indispensable to Marion and she frequently exclaimed she would not know what to do without her. Claire had to alter Marion’s clothes nearly every week now.

“Dear Claire,” Marion sighed that afternoon after the doctor had left. “You can’t have a moment’s rest with all this sewing.”

“Never did I sew for a happier occasion,” Claire replied cheerfully.

Claire had gone into service with Monsieur Beaumont a few years before and Marion had grown very fond of her. Upon her marriage Monsieur Beaumont had insisted that she take Claire with her to her new home and Claire had been most happy to go. She not only respected her mistress deeply, she cared for her.

At first Javert, who had not been in the habit of keeping many servants, had thought that a manservant, a maid and Madame Bisset the housekeeper, would have been quite sufficient. Marion had hinted gently that a cook might be a desirable addition, since the house was quite large enough to keep Madame Bisset busy without her having to worry about the meals.

Anxious to provide Marion with the style of living she had always been accustomed to very aware that the hiring and instructing of servants is the prerogative of the lady of the house, Javert had agreed. Not long after the cook, Marion had also hired a scullery maid. She did not stay long, however, being a rather unreliable girl and was soon replaced with the young but very diligent Nicolette.

So now Madame Fourre ruled the kitchen and instructed Nicolette, while Madame Bisset kept house with Claire and Paul to help her. With the new addition to the family, there must now also be a new addition to the servants. The nurse that was to be hired to attend to Marion during her confinement would not stay long, but if there was to be a child there must be a nursery maid.

“It is a pity,” Marion said to Javert. “That Louisa’s old nursery maid is not available. Louisa was very sad to let her go when they had to engage a governess.”

Javert nodded, but his concern in this matter did not match Marion’s. Of course nothing less than a woman with a stellar reputation and the very best of morals would be good enough for Javert to take care of his child, but at present his main concern was the health of Marion. This, of course, included the health of their unborn baby and this joint concern precluded every other kind of worry.

To Marion’s relief, however, she could not give her husband much cause for worry, her little fainting spell had been an isolated incident. He still took care to ask after her health at least once a day, however, increasingly unwilling to leave her along for the long hours he worked at the Conciergerie. Truth be told Marion was always extremely happy to see him come home at the end of the day. Not that she did not feel this way before, but the feeling certainly increased when she thought of him not only as her husband, but also as the father of their child. Their evenings were spent comfortably at home, sometimes in the company of Marion’s family, but usually very content to be alone together.

“We have not yet discussed what we shall name our child,” Marion said one such evening.

Javert put down his newspaper and gave her a thoughtful look.

“If it was a boy, would you like to name it after yourself?” Marion smiled, thinking of a little Emile.

There was a moment of hesitation, but then Javert shook his head. His first name had been his mother’s inventions, his last name his father’s legacy. He felt that he had made the latter his own through his endeavours, but for the first he had never found much use, until the day that Marion started using it.

“Not after myself,” he said.

Marion gave him a gentle look and did not ask for his reasoning. Neither did she even think of asking him after the name of his father. She was thankful that Javert extended the love he felt for her to her dear family and knew better than to insist upon him changing his feelings towards his own parents.

“We could name a son for your father,” Javert proposed.

“Only Luc has gone before us,” Marion said. “Constantin was named for my father.”

“Was Camille then named for your mother?” Javert asked, not able to remember if the origin of the children’s names had ever been explained to him.

“No, Camille was the name of Louisa’s grandmother,” Marion explained. She thought of her own mother and smiled. “If we would get a daughter, I would love to name her after my mother, Éliane,” she said.

Javert repeated the name to himself and nodded slowly.

“My father tells me it means ‘sun’,” Marion said absentmindedly, remembering the few times she had heard her father use her mother’s name.

Javert remained silent, not wanting to disturb her thoughts, which he hoped were filled with fond memories. Finally, Marion lifted up her eyes again and said: “We might give our son my father’s second name.”

“What is your father’s second name?” Javert asked smilingly.

“Jean,” Marion answered. “A simple, honest name I think.”

Javert’s smile faltered. Marion perceived it, but she did not know the reason.

“You dislike the name?” she asked.

“I do not dislike it,” Javert replied.

He smiled at her, but Marion could still see the remnant of a disconcerted look in his eyes.

“And I agree with you,” he continued. “It is a good and honest name, but…”

He hesitated and Marion waited expectantly.

“I think your father’s second name should be our son’s second also,” Javert decided.

“I do like that idea,” Marion agreed. “But that leaves us with half a name for both our possible children.”

She found Javert too thoughtful to seriously return to the subject, however.

“Perhaps the name will come to us in time, when we know if it is a son or a daughter we are naming,” she said, rising from her seat.

Javert immediately rose with her, eager to support her. “You should not move so quickly,” he admonished her gently, taking her arm.

“Mon chéri, you must stop worrying,” Marion laughed. “Or you will be quite sick with worry if I ever do become a little unwell later on.”

...

This prediction, luckily, did not come true. As the weeks passed and Marion’s discomfort and nerves increased, Javert’s anxiety did not. Whenever Marion was in distress, Javert was immediately calm and his steady assurance was of great comfort to her.

“I need not have worried, Papa,” she said to her father, during one of his increasingly frequent visits. “But is it not strange that he should fret over imaginary evils, but not even flinch when he sees me in actual pain?”

Monsieur Beaumont smiled knowingly. “Nothing more natural, my dear,” he said. “Considering the type of man he is.”

Marion gave him an amused smile. “And what type of man is my husband?” she asked.

“A man used to always being in arms against something,” her father answered. “Whether it be crime, injustice or violence… Such a man will not flinch or shy away in the face of any danger, but he must have something real to fight. The imaginary evils you speak of are a greater affliction to a man such as Javert than any real threat, for they cannot be fought and beaten like a real threat can.” He smiled at his daughter, who was considering his representation of Javert’s character.

“You may be right,” she said. “I had never thought about it in such way. But however the case may be I am grateful for his steady resolve and comfort. He has not always been as understanding as he is now.”

“A good character is not always an easy one,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled.

“It is not,” Marion laughed softly. “But it is dependable.”

“In your husbands case it certainly is,” her father agreed.

He gave her an attentive look. “Is there any news regarding the nurse that is to be hired soon?” he asked.

“I think I have at last found a candidate that will please my husband,” Marion replied. “He is very particular.”

“And so he should be,” Monsieur Beaumont nodded.

“Papa,” Marion laughed. “By that I mean _more_ particular than myself and surely you cannot think I would think lightly on such matters?”

“Even so,” he said with a smile. “I think in this case his scruples are only to his credit.”

They talked for a while longer, her father only leaving when it was around the time Javert could be expected to come home. When he did Marion immediately told him about the nurse that had been recommended to her.

“She has excellent references,” she said. “I think she meets even your high standards.”

“Then let her come on an interview,” Javert agreed.

He thought it was high time they found a nurse. The time of Marion’s confinement came ever closer and it would certainly ease his mind to know there would be someone to provide medical attention whenever it was needed.

...

The recommended nurse was found to be satisfactory and was hired the following week. She was not a midwife, but her experience was extensive and she was used to nursing women back to health after a delivery. More importantly, she was a cheerful, capable woman that did her best to put Marion at ease. To her she was positively chatty, but to Javert she only spoke when spoken to.

“You need not be afraid of my husband,” Marion sighed one morning. “He is not as grave as he seems.”

Smilingly the nurse shook her head. She had heard Monsieur Javert speak to his wife in the most gentle way imaginable, but she was certain he was very grave. At least to his servants and at least at this moment in time, when his wife was in so much discomfort.

...

The nurse did not quite change her opinion of Javert, but her admiration for the gentleness he showed towards his wife did grow as she saw more of it. Monsieur Javert read to his wife nearly every evening. Marion often teased him that she felt it was her duty to coax him into reading to her.

“After all,” she laughed. “I am too tired to read to you and what would become of your literary pursuits if I did not force you to read to me?”

“Do I look like I need to be forced, ma chérie?” Javert smiled, turning a page of the novel.

It was very true, however, that Javert’s enjoyment of books was still inexplicably linked to Marion. Having her read to him was a great enjoyment, reading to her was a labour of love, but from his own inclination alone he rarely took up a book. If Marion was disappointed, having hoped she would turn him into a true reader, she never expressed this beyond her gentle teasing. A good thing too. For she could not have been excused, as her father would have told her, for fixating on a single blemish on what could not be called anything short of a reformed character.

As the days passed Marion’s discomfort grew and she was no longer fully able to reassure her husband in his worries. The truth was that she was more scared than she cared to admit. The nurse was not worried, however, and assured Marion that she needn’t be either.

“Before coming to you I had been attending to Madame la Baronne Pontmercy,” she told Marion with a look of importance. “And with _her_ I was worried. So slight and little a thing as she is, even though it was her second child.”

She gave Marion a bright smile. “But you are strong, Madame,” she said. “I can tell. There is no need to worry, truly.”

Marion tried to smile back. She was not quite reassured, but she felt she had to at least try to be calm. “It is a fine morning,” she said, managing to sound like her cheerful self. “It is a shame to spend it in bed.”

Lately her discomfort had been disturbing her sleep in the most tiresome way. She woke so often at night that it was now not unusual for her to sleep during the day. Javert, anxious not to interfere with her necessary rest, had been sleeping in his own bedroom for the last couple of days. Marion did not much like this arrangement, but consented to it because she was equally unwilling to disturb his rest with her constant waking.

Upon first being married Javert had expected himself and his wife to keep separate bedrooms. Marion, whose parents had been used to sharing a bed, had been disappointed. She decided not to press her husband, however, as she was very aware it must be quite a shocking change to him that had always lived alone, to suddenly share a family home. Javert insisted that she took the largest, finest room on the upper floor as her own. His first thought was always of Marion’s comfort and he himself was very content with a small bedroom adjoining his study.

Marion complied, not breathing a word of her displeasure in this arrangement to anyone. She was quietly confident that Javert would gradually come to understand the benefits of a shared marital bedroom and as it happened he very soon did. The fine, large bedroom had therefore become his principal bedroom as well. His own private bedroom was always kept ready for him and although Marion could not remember the last time he had slept in it before her troubles began, she knew he would bolster at the mere suggestion of it being changed.

Claire entered the room to help Marion with her toilette, but before Marion had fully risen from the bed she let out a cry of shock and grasped the bedpost for support. Claire turned pale, but the nurse was not fazed.

“Steady now, Madame,” she said. “No need to doubt your legs, they will support you.”

“But it is not my time yet,” Marion protested. She stood, but refused to let go of the bedpost.

The nurse turned to Claire, who looked from her mistress to the nurse and back with frantic eyes. “I think the doctor should be called now,” the nurse said calmly.

“I want Louisa,” Marion said, turning pale. “Fetch me Louisa, please.”

Claire ran out of the room and ran to Javert’s study. Before she could knock he opened the door, having heard her running footsteps.

“What is it?” he demanded.

“The doctor is to be called,” Claire said breathlessly. “And Madame wishes for her sister-in-law.”

“Then you shall go to Monsieur Luc Beaumont’s house,” Javert said calmly, but quickly. “And I shall instruct Paul to fetch the doctor.”

Claire curtsied and had nearly turned around when Javert called her back.

“After you have visited Madame Beaumont, take care to leave a message for her father also,” he instructed.

“Yes, Monsieur,” she said and then she ran off as fast as a maid was allowed to run.

Javert stood in his empty study, looking at the door she had forgotten to close behind her. His throat was dry and his heart was beating unusually loud. Javert was not in the habit of making idle wishes, but at this moment he wished time would pass a little quicker and bring him to a day where the health of his wife and child were assured and all the danger was past. He did not call for Paul, but hurried downstairs to the servants' quarters himself.

“Paul!” he called out, the manservant starting to hear his master’s voice all the sudden.

“Yes, Monsieur?” he enquired, springing to his feet.

“Fetch the doctor,” Javert ordered curtly.

Paul opened his mouth to speak, but before he could Javert interrupted him: “Your mistress has need of him.”

Eyes widening in comprehension Paul shut his mouth, nodded and ran off as fast as Claire had done. Javert, having done all he could at present, hesitated for a moment. Then he turned round abruptly and went upstairs. At Marion’s bedroom door he hesitated once more. It was quiet within. He knocked. The nurse opened the door and curtsied and stepped aside. Javert was surprised to see Marion was not in bed. She was reclining on her chaise longue in her nightgown, her hair braided carefully to keep it out of her face. She looked very flushed and very uncomfortable.

“Shall I not help you to your bed?” he asked, meaning to sound gentle, but his voice coming out rather strained.

“Forgive me, Monsieur,” the nurse said quietly. “Madame is quite comfortable and if Madame moves to her bed now she will only have to be moved to the delivery bed later.”

Marion did not speak, but she held out her hand, so Javert went up to her and pressed it tight. As Marion did not speak, he did not either. He stood beside the chaise longue holding her hand, without knowing how much time passed before they heard the arrival of the doctor. Javert moved, thinking of going to greet the doctor. But Marion did not relinquish his hand, so he stayed.

“Good morning Monsieur Javert, Madame Javert,” the doctor spoke cheerfully when he entered. He carried a bigger bag than usual and Paul followed with something that looked like something that was not quite a bed and not quite a table.

“Good morning,” Marion replied.

Javert merely nodded.

“It seems nature has taken us rather by surprise,” the doctor went on in his cheerful manner. “Nothing to worry about, however, I assure you.”

The doctor exchanged a glance with the nurse and then looked at Javert. His free hand was clenched to a fist and every time Marion made a noise of pain or discomfort his mouth pressed into a grim line.

“Perhaps it would be better if-” the doctor began.

At that moment a carriage rattled in the street below.

“Louisa!” Marion gasped eagerly.

“I shall fetch her to you,” Javert said immediately and he hurried out of the room.

Upon arriving in the hallway he was not only greeted by Louisa, but by Marion’s father as well. Claire, who was busy shutting the door, turned round with a flushed face and curtsied at Javert. He did not even look at her, but said in a restrained voice:

“Claire, show Madame Beaumont upstairs.”

Claire breathed an unintelligible reply and all but ran up the stairs, followed by Louisa, who smiled warmly at Javert in passing. Javert made a movement that indicated a wish to follow, but Monsieur Beaumont laid a hand on his arm. There was a short silence in which Javert regarded his father-in-law tensely before he gave a stiff nod and said:

“Can I offer you a drink?”

“Please,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled and they went into the drawing room.

They sat down in silence, Monsieur Beaumont knowing very well there was nothing he could say to Javert that he had not already thought of and Javert sometimes nearly forgetting his father-in-law was present. At length he recollected, however, that while he was in great anxiety for his wife, Monsieur Beaumont must feel the same except for his only daughter.

“Forgive me,” he said, making an effort. “Are you well?”

“As well as yourself,” Monsieur Beaumont said with a subdued smile. “Your maid found me visiting with Louisa when she came to deliver your message. It seemed best to bring them both back here in my carriage. I sent word to Phillipe and she left a message for Luc, but we urged them not to come. Men, you know, can be of very little use in matters such as these.”

Before Javert could make an answer, they were both startled by a sudden cry of pain coming from upstairs. All conversation was abruptly put to an end and neither of them could do anything but sit and hope. Javert dreaded to hear such a cry again. It was all he could do to remain seated.

Had Javert been asked earlier what he would have thought himself to be doing at a moment like this, he would have imagined himself to be praying. But he was not. Javert thought of nothing but Marion. There was no room in his mind for anything but his love for his wife and his all-encompassing need for her to be alright. In short, depending on personal philosophies, Javert had either never been further for praying, or had never before prayed so sincerely.

Time passed, how much it was quite impossible to tell. There was no way to know how things were getting on. They heard Claire move, running for water or towels or whatever it was she was instructed to fetch, but that was all. And then, without warning, there was a different cry. A high, heartbreaking and joy-inducing wail. Javert and Monsieur Beaumont both got to their feet, almost without realizing it. Infant cries filled the house and were quieted down again.

“Well…” Monsieur Beaumont breathed, but Javert did not say a word.

There were quick footsteps on the stairs and the nurse appeared. A towel was wrapped around her arms like a muff, hiding her hands, and she was missing her apron. She curtsied upon entering the drawing room through its door that had been left open.

“All has gone well,” the nurse announced happily. “I would have brought you your son, Monsieur, except your wife does not allow him to be moved beyond her sight.”

“My son?” Javert repeated, speaking the words without fully comprehending their meaning.

He scarcely heard Monsieur Beaumont’s elated expressions and congratulations, but he returned his smile when his father-in-law grasped his hand and shook it.

“And they are both well?” Javert asked the nurse urgently.

“In excellent health and very good spirits,” the nurse smiled. “The doctor will stay awhile longer to be sure, of course.”

“Then go and assist him,” Javert said immediately.

“Certainly, Monsieur,” the nurse said, a little taken aback and with a curtsy she vanished.

Monsieur Beaumont waited until he heard Javert exhale a deep breath. Then he smiled at his son-in-law and amused himself for a moment with the thought that no matter what age we reach, new experiences will always be able to make nervous beginners out of us all. Javert could not be called a young man in any way, but right now he was the youngest of fathers. And Monsieur Beaumont, who was less than fifteen years his senior, was still nearly forty years his senior as a parent.

“Congratulations,” he said emphatically and Javert smiled.

They waited again, but this time there was only happy expectation, no dread or anxiety any longer. Eventually they heard footsteps again and this time Louisa appeared.

“Will you come up and see your wife and child, brother?” she smiled at Javert.

He gave her a look of alarm and gratefulness and quickly walked past her. Monsieur Beaumont smiled, pressed Louisa’s hand happily and followed his son-in-law. Javert entered first. He walked past the portable delivery bed and straight to the bed where Marion lay. She looked exhausted, but her face had been freshly washed and in her arms she held a white bundle.

“Congratulations, Monsieur Javert,” the doctor said with a smile. “A strong and healthy boy.”

Unable to speak, Javert nodded at the doctor and leaned over Marion to see his child.

“He is perfect, mon chéri,” Marion breathed, looking up at Javert with shining eyes and she held out his son to him.

Javert reached out to take him, but hesitated. He awkwardly took the little bundle in his arms and the dread of holding something so precious and vulnerable nearly overtook him.

“Allow me,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled and he adjusted Javert’s hands so he might properly support his son’s tiny body.

Javert sat down in the chair placed beside Marion’s bed and looked at his son, speechless. He looked at Marion and she smiled, he almost smiled back and then he looked back at the little red face framed by the cotton cap.

“Oh, Marion,” Javert whispered and at that moment the baby opened his eyes.

His lashes lifted and he looked up at Javert with an enquiring gaze. Those eyes, uncommonly awake for a newborn, were so like his own that it startled Javert. They were darker than his, but behind the dark baby blue the hint of grey was already visible.

“Look at him,” Marion whispered rapturously and then she turned her eyes on her father. “Do you see it, Papa?”

“I do indeed,” Monsieur Beaumont laughed softly. “I do not believe I have ever before seen an infant that frowns.”

But the child was not frowning. His face was tranquil, it was the look in his eyes that gave the impression of frowning. A look that was just as thoughtful and quiet as Javert’s. Javert still could not speak. He held his son and he felt his wife close and felt like he must never move again.

“What a serious child he will be,” Monsieur Beaumont smiled.

“Nonsense,” Marion said lovingly, putting her hand on Javert’s arm. “He will be just like his father…”

Her father gave her an amused look, but did not argue. The nurse had left the room and the doctor was politely standing aside, while the new parents admired their child.

“Have you decided on a name for my grandchild?” Monsieur Beaumont asked when Javert finally managed to lift his gaze from his son’s face.

“His second name shall be your second name,” Marion said gently. “But we were hoping his first would come to us in the moment.”

“I think…” Javert said slowly, his voice a little choked.

Marion smiled at him and as he looked at her flushed face he smiled back at her.

“Do you know his name?” Marion asked.

“I think I would like to call him Clément,” Javert said quietly.

Marion’s face was all softness as she looked from his face to her son’s.

“Clément,” she said tenderly. “Compassion…”

“Something I also did not know was lacking in my life before I found it,” Javert said, looking at her with a gleam in his eyes that might very well have been caused by tears.

“Clément Jean Javert,” Marion said, swallowing the lump in her throat and squeezing her husband’s hand.

Young Clément made a soft sound and his parents looked at him with the mix of unbridled adoration and repressed alarm that is present in nearly every newly made mother and father.

“I do recommend that Madame take her rest now,” the doctor said pleasantly.

“Quite right,” Monsieur Beaumont agreed.

“Of course,” Javert spoke calmly, raising his head with authority without losing his current softness of manner. “However, I will not be leaving my wife.”

The doctor opened his mouth to speak, looked from Monsieur Javert’s face to his wife’s, and thought the better of it. He nodded and took a seat, wishing to remain a little longer to ensure Madame Javert’s good health.

Javert held his son and watched as Marion closed her eyes, her face worn with fatigue, but lovely to him all the same. As mother and child slept, he thought earnestly about the future, and to his surprise he felt a peculiar lightness take the place of his accustomed gravity.

“My son,” he thought, looking down on him. “My wife and my son…”

.

Marion recovered as fast as anyone could wish and on a Sunday not long after little Clément’s birth he was baptized. There were many attendants at the church and afterwards family and friends filled the Javerts’ family home to bless and celebrate the young life of their firstborn.

Luc and Louisa Beaumont were appointed godparents and Constantin and Camille were delighted with their little cousin. Monsieur Beaumont was as proud a grandfather as he had been at their respective christenings and Philippe was a most affectionate uncle.

“I do not begrudge Luc the right of the eldest brother,” he told Marion. “But if I shall not be named the godfather of your second child, I will be deeply hurt.”

He smiled at Clément, who laid contently in his mother’s arms clad in a white christening gown. Marion glanced at the other end of the room where Javert was speaking to some of his colleagues. Some of them were rather loud. Wordlessly she beckoned the new nursery maid.

“Quite enough excitement for one day I think,” she said gently, placing Clément in her arms. “Take him upstairs please, Adèle.”

“Yes, Madame,” Adèle replied with a gentle bow of the head.

Marion felt Javert’s eyes upon her and she smiled at him. He watched the maid go with his child and then looked back at her with a proud smile.

“I never saw a man so altered,” Philippe laughed, lowering his voice. “Look at his face.”

“Whatever are you talking about,” Marion said warmly. “He has always looked like that.” She smiled. “To me at least.”

“Heed my words, dear sister,” Philippe quipped. “You shall have six children and he shall dote on them all while they drive you to distraction.”

“Well,” Marion said, not taking him the least bit serious. “Then I am sure we can spare one of the more exasperating ones for you to be godfather to.”

Philippe made a show of expressing his indignation until he made Marion laugh out loud. Javert came to join them, possibly to rein in his exuberant brother-in-law, but certainly to stand by Marion and press her hand contently. His happiness was plainly visible on his face and Marion smiled at him with an expression very similar to his own.

“Ah, my husband,” she said when Paul came to refill the glasses. “Would a toast be in order, do you think?”

“I should think it would be,” Javert replied warmly and under Marion’s delighted gaze he raised his glass high enough for all the guests to see.

“A toast,” he said. He spoke with such sincerity a stranger might have mistaken it for soberness, but he was among friends and family and they understood his meaning.

“To new life,” he concluded and the whole room echoed, Marion most cheerfully of all:

“New life!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This epilogue took me a lot longer and turned out a lot bigger than I thought it would. But it needed to be written, it really did.
> 
> Many many thanks to Groucha for researching and translating 1830’s birthing practices for me from Gabet’s “Avis aux femmes enceintes et éducation physique des enfants” (1801) and Jacquemier’s “Manuel des accouchements et des maladies des femmes grosses et accouchées” (1846). Without her encouragement this piece would not have been written! She also advised me about the customs of sleeping in separate bedrooms or having a marital bedroom. I really cannot thank her enough!
> 
> Finally you also have her to thank for Monsieur Beaumont helping Javert to hold his son and the baby’s eyes looking just like Javert’s, she requested those lovely details. 
> 
> I also want to thank my sister who proofread this for me (like she did all the chapters) and whom I most sincerely apologise to for pushing her much deeper into the Les Mis fandom than I ever was.
> 
> That said I think I have now made Monsieur and Madame Javert happy enough for me to truly leave them be.
> 
> Thank you all very much for reading! I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it.


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